


Sunlight

by Requestedgems



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Angst and Feels, DBH, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Gavin Reed Backstory, Gavin Reed Being Less of an Asshole, Gavin Reed Being an Asshole, Gavin Reed Being an Idiot, Gavin Reed Needs a Hug, Gavin Reed is Bad at Feelings, Good Parent Hank Anderson, Hank Anderson & Connor Friendship, Hank Anderson Adopts Connor, Hurt Gavin Reed, Motifs, Protective Gavin Reed, Reader is reckless, Reader-Insert, We love him, also, also a lot of motifs in this, better writing in this one I promise, but she has some stuff going on, complicated story line, connor is still a sweetheart, connor is your buddy, detroit become human - Freeform, gavin reed just needing to master emotional depth, gavin reed needing to find healthy ways to express himself, gavin reed who doesn't swear every two seconds, hank anderson being a good dad, hank anderson single dad supporting his sweet children, hank is around for emotional support, hank is still the mentor, idk you choose, like a supportive family, maybe you can sparse them out, not really talked about directly but you'll figure it out, ooh yall gon love this, or two angsty teenagers, plus gavin has some big boi issues, reader has an interesting past, reader is a wonderful person, reader is v smart, that don't include the f word, we deal with them all
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-17
Updated: 2020-04-01
Packaged: 2021-03-01 05:21:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 23,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23179885
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Requestedgems/pseuds/Requestedgems
Summary: Gavin swears off androids for the rest of his life and is perfectly content kicking them around and ignoring the tin cans. But then you come along. You treat them like human beings even though they're clearly not and he gets pissed, really pissed. Why treat them so well when you're just doing crowd control with them? Why not treat him better? Why choose them over your own people? He doesn't understand you. Maybe that's why he's intrigued by you. Maybe that's why he has to get to know you better. If not to change your mind about these plastic pieces of garbage, than because he can't stop thinking about you.
Relationships: Gavin Reed & Original Female Character(s), Gavin Reed/Reader
Comments: 15
Kudos: 72
Collections: I think I left my consciousness on your front doorstep





	1. it's alright; i won't forget

**Author's Note:**

> Hey DBH fandom!
> 
> It's been so long since I've been able to dig back into the beautiful world of Detroit: become human, but corona is here and that means I have free time to write as much as my heart contents. This story, just as relevant as Rain, has more story building going on so there are more literary elements hidden all over the place. I'm trying to develop my writing and hopefully publish a novel of my own. Until that fateful day arrives, enjoy this! 
> 
> I hope you adore this just as much as you adored the last multi-chapter fic I posted and I love every single one of you for your support and kindness; it really means the world to me.
> 
> With love,  
> Ruby

Sunlight filters through an open window. Water swirls in a pond, beams of light reaching through the depths. Clouds, white and yellow, nearly obscured by the golden pillars shooting through the sky.

You feel the call of the void tugging against your wings, brushing against you like the warm and welcoming breeze grants its fleeting touch, whispering a language only the two of you speak, ushering you down to the deep divide. And you want to go. You want to feel the ebb and flow of its heartbeat, its steady pulse. 

But you can’t.

You must stay safe, stay present, stay afloat. You must _stay._

You must stay for him.

\----

He’s cornered. Your blazer whips behind you, following the ebb and flow of the wind as it hurtles away from you in spirals of chaos. “I’m almost to the bridge!” You call Detective Reed through the speakers planted inside of your head. It’s easier than fishing your cell from off your belt.

You’re running hard, harder than you should be considering the circumstances. And all you can think about is the song, the one that ties everyone together. It’s a steady drum, a constant thump, a beat that is found in everyone and everything. It’s unity and it’s a human as anything else.

And the man you’re chasing is singing nothing but fear and screams for release, for freedom. You grasp for it, hearing the melody in your mind, visualizing a drum of freedom and a clock ticking down from 10. 

But even though you may try, there’s nothing you can do to guarantee he’ll live without restraint. 

You pick up the pace. “I’m coming. Meet you there in five.” His voice is steady but you can only imagine the song in his heart, the speedy tempo it has, the anger that’s always present in it. That’s how you know it’s him, even when you can’t see him. Even when you think he may not be there.

His heartbeat, his passionate tune, is nowhere near close enough to prevent what you know is going to happen. 

“Detective Reed, you’ll be too late.” You huff. The escapee’s dark clothing still remains in your sights and you hone in on it, keeping it directly in front of you. “Make a perimeter around the bridge. I think he might jump.”

You can hear the wind roaring past your ear canal, the breeze becoming more disturbed and irritated by the minute. It could be your speed. It could be the determination it feels in you, echoing out in space and particles. It was much more likely that the wind recognized the conflict inside of your evader and reflected their turmoil. So that you could feel it in your face as much as you recognized it in your heart. So that you’d recognize that the drum won’t quiet.

Gavin never does respond, but you don’t need him to. His silence speaks for him.

You hunt the man in the black hoodie down, tracing him across train tracks, rooftops, and through the unrelenting wind, taking you closer and closer to the moment where choices will be made and options will be missed and the truly human realize their humanity.

And then they’ll see the water.

And then the freedom that could be there’s if they just held on will be washed away with such a fierce and violent current and everything they ever chose to believe and whatever worth they finally gave themselves is gone.

You didn’t want to see that. You didn’t want to believe that the little hope you’ve scrounged for yourself could be snubbed out just like that.

He stopped, the wind died, and the bridge creaked. You recognize this from some half-forgotten dream of freedom and loss and disillusion. 

No matter how bright that sunlight might have been, how golden everything looked in your mind, the promise of oblivion and emptiness still remained. The covenant of amnesia would stand by, waiting for you to throw away everything you’ve worked for, erase you from memory, make the days you spent on earth like dust floating in the air: coating everything, but leaving an impression on no one.

And that’s not where the story ends, where it _should_ end. 

But he’s standing there in black and there’s something in him that begs you to leave him to his fate. His stare is hostile and you feel that turmoil spill out of those two cybernetic orbs onto his face, bleeding through his features, turning them to stone, transforming his mind into rock.

The sun breaks through the clouds and the dream weaves its way through your mind, steady and clear. He’ll jump and you won’t be able to stop him, but that doesn’t mean you wouldn’t dive off with him, despite your fears. 

If you confront the abyss head-on, maybe your goal will keep you afloat.

“You can’t stop me.” He stands, arms wide open, ready for the black hole that will suck him in. His pulse, the beat that thrums in him, quiets. It sounds like a lullaby, like a ballad. “I know what you do.” He slips his hood off and the sunlight spills over him, clarifying the nose you saw, the stark blue eyes he possesses. 

He looks angelic. 

“I know that humans always want to say that they’ll be better, that they’ll protect me and treat me like one of their own.” The blues in his eye lock onto yours and he watches. You know he’s waiting for you to speak but you’re better than that. Words won’t fix the torture he’s faced. Apologizes and promises just make it worse. 

“ _But you know what?_ You’re liars. You forget and you don’t care. And I'm tired of losing all of my choices to the words of promises and creeds. I don’t want to be another face of abuse and oppression.” You watch the sunlight filter through his hair and feel the release in his heart.

His pulse changes, altering to fit the catharsis he’s sure is coming. “Good thing I’m not human.” You speak and the wind stirs, shifting from its originally calm state. His eyes of ice and stone melt, but only slightly. He questions the validity of your statement and you remove your skin, down to the perfectly smooth, white alabaster color that connects you two.

“You‘re right” He smirks and closes his rigid eyes. “You’re just another pawn.”

“If you think the water will be able to erase your pain, it won’t. It will always be lingering in the back of your mind, just below the surface of your thoughts.” You put the shield of your coloring back up and see the crack in his conviction. “That’s the curse we live with. Perfect memory. You’ll remember jumping off and you’ll tell yourself that the end will be worthwhile, but then you’ll remember what it was to truly breathe, the lack of oxygen deep within those pressing depths slowly strangling you.” His pulse speeds slightly. “You won’t even be free in the end.”

He turns to you, sunlight holding him in gold. “Do you remember when the African slaves lost their choice? When their voice was drowned in tyranny and death?”

“And do you remember,” you challenged. “When they joined voices to plant the seeds of rebellion? When they rallied to the cry ‘we will not bow’?”

“But you forgot the best one.” He smirks, beginning to lean. “The once famous words that founded this great nation, the same words echoed through the ranks of slaves.” The sun brightens in intensity and it becomes hard to look him in the eye. “Give me liberty,” he gives in to gravity. “Or give me death.”

And he fell. 

You dove right after him.

The current swept you in its arms and threw you down its waters. You didn’t resist, knowing that fighting was useless, but the light filtered through the river, bringing your focus to the sky above you and the man fighting for his life in front of you. 

The bottom frightened you, the darkness seeming to reach towards you, trying to wrap around your ankle and drag you down to its depths. It couldn’t touch you; the light kept the rigid arms and spiny hands at bay. Your heart ran, and you tried to slow your accelerated pulse.

After a chilling time in the waters, and a hard time hearing the water’s heartbeat instead of the man you were hunting down, you were able to grab onto him and pull him back to the light, back to the thing of nature that loved and adored him.

He believed that the light was welcoming him home, not that it was the catalyst for a life in truth.

Breaking the surface, you fought against the waves, forcing the two of you to the shore. “Where the fuck are you?” Detective Reed’s voice hissed with annoyance and irritation. 

You spit water from your lungs and coughed, choking on the substance you previously believed would have claimed both of you. “Maybe a few miles down. He jumped.” You voice warbles and cracks, the water clogs every word.

“Holy fuck. You went after him? Are you insane?” His gruff voice blared through your head and you grimaced against its intensity.

“Yes, I went after him. He’s right here next to me, I pulled us out.” You huffed, laying him back so the light could dry off his clothing, the breeze was too gentle.

He paused before speaking. “He’s just an android. So what if he died. Doesn’t make a difference to the rest of us.”

You smiled and brushed the stray hairs from his forehead. You could only imagine the song of his heart now. Erratic and jumpy. Very usual for him. “I’m just off the highway by 68th.” You ended the call. You didn’t have time for his input, for his heavy ignorance that chokes everyone and everything by his harsh words.

Your rescue stirred beside you. “How am I not dead?” His voice graveled and rocked, unsteady and warbled by water.

And as you turned, the sunlight swathed him in direct light. “Because liberty wouldn’t let you.”

\----

“(Name)!” He called but he didn’t need to. You heard his pulse from a mile away, the song weaved in stubbornness and the sharp staccato of irritation. But you stood, helping the man who’s name you learned was Emmet, up and towards the cop car.

“Good lord. You certainly dragged a piece of work out of the water.” Emmet only looked at you, his song jagged and irregular, very unlike what you knew of him before. His face is still stone but you recognize the hidden fear. You carry a similar fear yourself.

Reed took his arm from you and slid it across his shoulders, supporting Emmet for you and surveying him at the same time. Reed’s glance was only fleeting but enough. He seemed angry, maybe for taking the initiative to save something of such little value, maybe for doing so without waiting for him. 

Either way, it mattered little to you. You’re good at deflecting his anger and ignoring the fury that he directs at you.

“Well, let’s get you dried off alright?” He brought Emmet towards the medical vehicle and you tailed behind him, admiring once again how the light adores him. Reed is gentle with him. Emmet still demonstrates signs of his discomfort but it smooths out as he perceives Gavin as less of a threat and more of a soothing party. It makes you happy, if only for a moment, to see the juxtaposition of such characters standing next to each other.

He sets him down with care and walks back over to you, carrying a blanket that he shoves into your hands. You pull it into you, wrapping your fingers around the soft material. “What were you thinking?” His arms cross and he stares, waiting for an explanation that you’re not sure you could viably give him and retain your sanity. “You just won’t give up on these guys.”

You smile and his eyes darken with annoyance. “Not a chance, Reed.”

“They’re plastic. They aren’t any better than us. They aren’t even human.” 

_And I’m not?_

But you won’t argue with him, not truly. 

He doesn’t understand. 

He can never understand what it’s like to be genetically engineered, to be molded together piece by piece, and still to have a functioning brain. You’ll never be true flesh and blood. You’ll never be united in the web of humanity, but you do know what it means to be human. You know what it means _to feel_. No matter what others tell you about yourself, your definition lies in your hands and your hands only.

“That may be. But they still deserve to be treated with humanity, to be treated as equals instead of slaves for whatever use their owners deem worthy.” Your ferocity leaps away from you, your words dissolving in the fire of your convictions and you try to reign it in.

He notices. “If they all believe they have choices, if they all become cognisant of their ‘freedoms’, then where does that leave their creators?” He speaks to you as if you’re one of _them_. Like you’re human. Like you could possibly understand where this discussion is going. 

“We should be like gods to them. They should thank us for their existence. Without our minds, they wouldn’t be walking this earth.” His words stab into your fake skin and you can feel the blood oozing out from every knife wound in your body. 

It brands itself into your mind, a permanent scar. “I refuse to let them be treated as items.”

“Then you’re an idiot.” His eyes shift. Blackness covers his features. “They’re not alive, (Name), and they never will be. Get your head together.” He shakes you a bit. “Know _their_ place and know yours.”

You’re well aware of your place and it will _never_ be with him. You are not a god, a crowned figurehead that uses their power for their own desires and openly oppresses and tortures those who fail to submit to their own will. You can never become something so greedy and corrupt.

The fact that he can’t see that means he has only scratched the surface of what he knows of you, that he’s only met a shadow of your true self. You’re obscured by the thoughts and feelings of Gavin Reed; you’re not a person to him. You’re a mirror, a perfect reflection of his thoughts and ideas. 

The clouds above you obscure the sun completely; your song morphs.

\--

Androids can’t dream.

They couldn’t because they needed some sort of off switch that includes a fully active brain. Your fully functional cognitive apparatus could be contained within wires and plugs. Every thought you formed, every decision you made, came from some written line of code communicated between bits of plastic and metal.

Every idea that seemed original to the outside world was created and implanted by your creators. By humans, your gods and owners. The people that would turn on a dime because a split idea proved dangerous to their goals and aspirations. 

Because they were afraid that they could lose.

You knew what it was like to lose. Each morning was another chance to witness the loss over and over again, to be reminded of it like you didn’t stare it directly in the face when you looked in the mirror.

You knew what it was like to fail and sacrifice and dedicate everything you had to save a dying dream. To be given the freedom to chose and still taking a wrong turn, falling down a hole and into obscurity.

And you were afraid that somewhere along the line you’d slip up. Too much would come rushing from your mouth and a dear piece of information would be revealed. It’d put everything in jeopardy. It’d alter the course of your fate.

You couldn’t dream, you couldn’t sleep, but you could prepare for the moment where the fall will come. And that was close enough to dreaming.

Every night, you’d run through simulations of the end, when everything would shatter; there wasn’t enough time in the world to collect all the little pieces and heal the damage. Never. Not once.

You could only ride the wave until it ended. You could only stay afloat until you were pulled under.

And until then you dug your fingernails into the one time you were able to see good. The one time the sunlight erupted everything in gold and sun and warmth. The one time it saved you for the blackness that you would eventually succumb to. 

\---

Three months of his insults against androids follow.

You try to ignore them, smoothing them over with tight-lipped smiles and small shows of protest when his slanderous comments become overwhelming for you. As much as it pains you to become this complacent, it is just a mask. You will tear it down one day, but for now, it protects you, keeps you safe.

The darkness, the same pull you felt in the water, calls out to you; it wants you to abandon everything and join them, join them all in the stillness of the calm.

But you can’t survive there. There’s still plenty of work left to do here.

\---

Connor, eyes detailing every inch of the room around you, turns to you, optics blinking back into total focus. “Traces of gunpowder residue on the walls. It’s likely a gun was fired within this location. My scans indicate that its origin was here.” He walks over and points to a corner of the room.

No sign of a gun or struggle lies in this room but the body lying in the grass outside says otherwise. You squint, turning on your other set of visual recognition skills, finding the same epicenter that Connor pointed out, but further analyzing the densities of each location gunpowder can be traced at.

“The shot was fired here, but it didn’t exit through the broken window.” You meander over to the outer wall, skimming your fingertips over the broken paint until you find it. “It went straight through the wall, right into the back of the victim’s head.”

Connor blinks in surprise. “Detective (Name), how did you solve that?” His voice is quizzical but there’s a hint of conviction layered underneath, as if he’s already established a possible explanation for your conclusion.

“Been in forensics for some time now, Connor. It’d be shocking if I didn’t piece that together.” Connor has a definite song, something that is perfectly rhythmic and synchronized. You’d think it would sound metallic and meticulous if you could compose. His song deepens in its rhythmic pulse and a warning bell goes off in you.

“I don’t intend to be rude, Detective, but how did you know that the powder density was larger here and eventually lead to its residue in the small hole in the wall?” Connor walks over to you and stands closer, attempting to bring his influence over you; he’s getting good at interrogating people.

But you see the hook he’s tried to cast. And you won’t fall into his hand that easily.

“Connor, the only one that can see the density would be you.” You smiled and his song becomes more clattering, its pulse synchronizing even more than before. “I’ve seen something like this in my other investigations. That’s the only reason I pointed this out.”

He squints. Then nods. 

“What’d you get?” Reed steps into the room. Noticing the proximity of you and Connor, he pauses, the shadows seeming to cross his face and strike all the harsh angles it can curl itself around. Your internal drum falters for a second.

He glances the two of you up and down before stepping in front of Connor, staring him down. “Well, plastic prick? What’d you find?”

Connor takes two healthy steps away from Detective Reed and you. “Actually, Detective Reed, I didn’t find this one. (Name) was able to locate the likely source of the bullet.”

Detective Reed turns on you, his pulse slightly buzzed and vexed, beating harder than it normally does. The shadows peel back a bit, but his eyes carry a tenebrosity that can only be linked to the change in his song. “Do go on.” He crosses his arms and watches you down his nose.

He doesn’t intimidate you; he underestimates you often. “Trajectory starts from there...and exits from here right into the victim’s skull.”

“How did you come to that conclusion?” His voice steels but there’s malleability to it. He’s willing to be convinced. 

“Gunpowder traces identified by Connor.” You gesture towards the man standing on the other side of the room. Detective Reed’s features go dark again and thunder booms in the background. 

You weren’t aware that it was supposed to storm today.

He hums and then bends down to see the origin of the gunpowder traces. “This where you identified the start of all this, pea brain?” He glares up at Connor and waits for him to respond.

Connor hesitates a moment, visibly uncomfortable under his direct stare. “That’s what I said, Detective.” You interject, trying to deflect a good amount of his fury onto yourself.

“I wasn’t talking to you, _Detective (name)_.” He draws out, annoyance clinging onto each syllable.

You open your mouth to combat Detective Reed’s harsh tone but Hank brings a team of scientists into the scene, feet shuffling across the floor.

“Hope you’re done interrogating the Detective, Gavin. But we have enough evidence to know your partner’s right in her statement.” He saddles up next to Connor, almost protectively. Connor relaxes but his analytical eyes stare into you. 

Detective Reed stands and flashes a mirthless smile. “Perfect timing as always, Hank.”

“You’re done here.” Hank nods at the exit and Detective Reed scoffs. 

He holds his hands up, swaggering out and around the corridor. Hank looks to you. He clears his throat as you attempt to pass.

“Thanks, Detective.” His blue eyes convey all that he’s referring to and you read it like you read binary code. Each letter flows through the back of your mind as you translate it and give it shape.

“Not a problem.” You smile and Hanks’ warm pulse changes, deviating a bit from the off and mysterious beat it carries to a calmer tune. It’s steadier and its edges are smoother. You have a feeling you’ll be fast friends.

“Get your ass over here, Detective!” Reed calls from the hallway and you turn to follow the voice.

“Detective (name)?” You pause, as if Connor’s voice built a barrier you’re not able to bypass. “Does rA9 mean anything to you?”

Your pulse thrums in your veins, flashes of the code pulse through your vision. A feeling of relief falls over you, but not without the back pulse that drags you further into a pit you’re not sure you’ll be able to free yourself from. But the freedom, the taste of emancipation overcomes your sense and renders you blinded by the promises it holds, all of the opportunities you haven’t discovered yet.

“It’s the dream.” You smile and walk out, knowing by the breaking of the rhythmic pulse that Connor now understands how correct he was.

\---

Rain pounds against the windows of the car as you and Detective Reed drive back to the station. Lightning cracks against the sky. Thunder rumbles, threatening a louder cacophony just after each bright flash.

“You two solved that awfully fast.” His knuckles are white against the steering wheel. The car feels humid and warm, each water droplet saturating the air clinging to your synthetic skin.

You only nod, but, judging by the racing of his pulse, that was not the correct response to calm him down. “Seem to make a great team.”

You turn and frown. You and Connor may have been together when you solved that issue, but you weren’t a team. You were two individuals who happened to accomplish a task together. Not partners; not like you and Detective Reed were.

“Connor and I are not a team.” You look out the window and watch how the wind kicks up and the sky darkens further. You’re still trying to process the idea that rain was never in the forecast. If this became worse, you could expect a tornado in your mist.

“Well, you were for this one.” He smarts, neck moving a little too awkwardly for your liking. The temperature in the car rises another degree.

You peer at him, the shadows coming to cloud him again. They become more pronounced the longer you stare, each grinning back at you as you inspect their locations. “We’re not a team like you and I are. We’re not partners.” You imagine sticking out your tongue at each little speck of darkness, beating them back with your words, destroying them with just a touch.

He glimpses over at you for a second and your eyes lock. There’s no darkness in them, no malice laying just behind his iris’, but there seems to be this prison, keeping his feelings contained and his eyes mild and blank. He shakes his head and returns his focus to the road.

But not before glancing over a second time, the little shadows gone and his song returning back to normal. The storm begins to lift and by the time you reach the department, the clouds are beginning to break, letting the cerulean of the sky shine through.

\---

The next few days pass by in a blur, Detective Reed seeming to lighten up after your words. He teases you a bit less, making sure no shifts happen in your eyes and the way you speak to him. 

He’s by you more often now, ensuring that the full extent of your teamwork is actualized. And he begins to tell you stories, bits of his past that slip through his mouth and into your head. 

You discover his isolation, his passion for drinking — beer and bourbon are his favorite, whiskey on an off day — and how his mother is his only surviving parent. 

He visits her at times but it’s painful. He doesn’t explain why. And you don’t pry. That’s the trade-off, pieces of information with no attachments. 

Eventually, he asks you about your parents; you confide that you have none and never had. He watches you, attempting to find bits of sadness and pain, but there are none waiting for him. 

You never needed parents, you were never human enough to deserve them. 

He doesn’t ask anything further about your parents but inquired if you’d learned about folk stories, tales meant to either scared you enough to stop you from doing “dumb shit” or point out some principle to apply to your life. 

Of course, you denied his question but you were familiar with a few of the stories. Enough references were made in your daily life that you picked it up rather quickly, looking up the stories as you went. 

“You know, you’re a lot like that idiot girl little red riding hood.” He smirks, looking at you as he drives you two to the next case. 

Your confusion appears in your brows and Detective Reed grins a little bit more. “You know, she runs right into the spooky and scary woods, ignores all the warning signs that the wolf is pretending to be her grandma and eventually gets eaten in the end.”

“Detective,” you look at him, confused at the mirth in his eyes. “I fail to see the connection.”

“You just run straight into danger, even when you know you might just die one of these times.” He scoffs, sliding the wheel to the right, flowing with the curve. “You’re a lot like her. You see all the warnings, you just ignore them.”

You sigh. Maybe he was right. You had one of the most advanced systems in calculating risks and potential movements. You remember seeing the stats and the numbers, but sometimes your job was bigger than the numbers implanted inside of your brain. Sometimes, it required a leap of faith, even when the odds were against you. 

“Sure,” you appease him. “I guess I can see where the evidence derived from.” The car stopped and the sunlight peeked behind the clouds. 

“Good.” He pops the car door open and swings himself out. “Come on, Red.”

You scoff and push the door open. “You know detective, you’re a lot like the reeds.”

“Yeah? How?” He crosses his arms and stares at you down his nose, a classical gesture for male dominance. It almost made you laugh. 

“The reeds do a lot of talking and rarely are still.” You grin. 

“You calling me a chatterbox, red?” He moves a little closer to you, threatening, but in a teasing manner.

You laugh, the first smile you can remember sharing with him, and wove from around him. “Well, I’m not calling you a quiet individual.”

He squints at you, following you with determination and purpose. His song jumps a little bit, bouncier than the normal tune he carries. “Say something like that again, _Red_ , and you might just find out how fast those missed warning signs catch up to you.”

“Okay, _Reed_ , I’ll try to keep that in mind.” 

\--

“Red, you ready?” He’s next to you. His song is strong and sturdy, with a twinge of anticipation laying underneath it, preparing for the moment it will be called into action. It’s strange; you’ve never heard his tune shift in this way. 

The sequins in your dress sparkle and shine as you stand next to him underneath the chandelier, the warm air carrying the sweet smell of red wine and expensive perfumes. You’ve never truly comprehended why such frivolous spending resulted from the rich wanting to throw a simple party. It appears to be a waste of time and resources, but humans have their own understanding of these occasions.

You move your dress slightly, ensuring your first steps will result in no accidental tripping. “Yes, Detective Reed, I’m ready.” His tux fits him perfectly, the lights from the chandelier wink through his hair. 

He nods and surveys again before holding a warm hand out to you. “I can walk by myself.” You assure him and begin to guide yourself down the stairs before he wraps your hand in his. You stare him down.

He notices, song speeding for a second. “Don’t get riled up, Red. This is just protocol.” He supports you as you walk down the steps, every step reassured by him.

Despite the fact that you truly don’t understand why this is such an established action, you feel a sense of security with him next to you. Even though your accurate reflex system would never allow you to fall, you wouldn’t mind him catching you if you happened to stumble.

“What, never been to a fancy dance before, Red?” He watches your silver shoes gently flashing from underneath your long skirt. His hand tightens around yours and you feel his eyes prod your face, waiting for a reaction. 

You shake your head, slightly ashamed of the confession you’re making. Another rite of passage denied by your status as an android.

“Not even prom? You had to at least go to homecoming,” He observes how you still shake your head in disagreement.

“Detective Reed, I’ve never done anything like this before.” You look over at him and the thrum of his heart slows for half a second before speeding up again. His eyes lack the fury that they possess but are open. It’s like he’s seeing you, truly seeing you, for the first time. His gaze draws you in and you fall into it before wrenching yourself out of the abyss.

You don’t have time for _this_ , for distractions.

He clears his throat and helps you down the last step before weaving your hand underneath his elbow, the crooks of your arms aligning. “Well, for starters, if we’re going to keep up an undercover profile, you can’t call me ‘Detective Reed’ anymore.” He walks the both of you forward and into the line of guests waiting to access the party. “And you’re going to have to get used to the both of us having more contact than we usually do.”

You can deal with the pretend adoration and affection, it’s easy to fake emotions, but seeing behind the fake and spotting the _feelings_ , the feelings that are true are harder to come to terms with, will be a challenge.

Feelings were complicated for you. You had your convictions, principles you held in your mind and a moral code by which you were consistently guided, but your thoughts and ideas in relation to other people proved the challenging aspect of adjusting to human life. These emotions you harbored for other people were more powerful than the ideas you held for yourself and the fact that they could override your original ideas startled you.

You still remember ignoring the fear of being swept away in that water in order to save Emmet. Because you felt like he needed saving, guidance, someone who will listen and understand him. Because you felt _emotions_ for him, you were able to ignore your original beliefs. 

The power, the danger, and the control that lurks just beyond the surface of these emotions becomes ever-present to you now. It’s just another thing to be on guard for. 

These emotions -- weaknesses -- were already opening up between you and Reed.

The two of you were growing closer every day, that was a fact. He no longer called you by your first name but exchanged it for the nickname he’d bestowed upon you. 

Red. And the name _became_ you. 

Red for the color of the shirts you began to wear to work, red for the caution you would throw to the wind, red for the little red riding hood that you so resembled. 

Sometimes your growing bond could be seen in the way you started shortening “Detective Reed” to “Reed”, edging away from the strict formality that was previously established between the two of you. If you were to give him a true nickname it would likely be something like _volcano, explosion, firecracker_. 

Something violent, explosive, and unpredictable. 

But to peel back even more layers to your already budding informality feels as though some lines may be crossed, some impressions given that aren’t necessarily true. If thoughts and emotions were as powerful as you were discovering them to be, this could end badly.

“So, what should I call you instead, detective?” You take a centering breath. Your name is Red; you’re used to blowing through warning signs and other explicit dangers. This should be no different.

He turns to you, looking at you for a second that feels like an hour. “Call me Gavin.”

The lights in the room brighten, the red of the roses becoming more vibrant, the gold of the walls shimmering, the crimson of your dress sparkling and winking at your partner. “Okay.” You concede, making sure your practiced steps remain sturdy and careful. There’s no backing down from this arrangement and you _won’t_. 

You’re strong. You’re red. You can achieve anything.

\----

“Have you danced before, Red?” He glanced in your direction, hand resting on your hip. He wasn’t kidding about the spacing the two of you were going to need. Every couple in the room was either pressed tightly against each other, dancing or were always standing close enough to touch. Stuck together like glue. Stuck like they were joined at the hip.

It nearly made you uncomfortable, if it weren’t for your uncanny ability to look past such feelings. Rather, you focused on the statistics. 89% of the room were coupled up. The remaining 11% remained by themselves or with a relatively large group of friends.

This was a night of dancing and intoxication, heavy intoxication. Intoxication leads to intimacy of some sort, whether social or physical. You wanted to inquire why everyone wanted alcohol so bad if this dance was supposed to be fun and exciting, but you figured it was something else you likely missed by not having your youth.

To be technically speaking, you were only two years old. As a human at the equivalent age, you would have a basic knowledge of speech and some underdeveloped motor functions; you wouldn’t even be able to remember the first few years of your life.

“No, not like this.” You focus on the target, still laughing with a woman, multiple women actually. 

Reed removes his arm from around you and steps back, offering his hand to you. “May I?”

You frown, eyebrows arching in confusion and suspicion. “May you what?”

“Jesus Christ, (Name),” He huffs and his song spikes back into the irritated staccato you know him for. “I’m asking you to dance.” He glances up at you, half of his face bathed in the light above and half of it out of the light’s touch, like something in it spooks the radiance on the first half of his face.

You stare, taken aback, then smile. “Why didn’t you say that in the first place?” You place your hand in his tentatively and his fingers coil around your palm, securing his hold on you before guiding you out onto the floor with him.

Counting in your head helps. _One, two, three._ Your arm is wrapped around his shoulder, hand pressing against his shoulder blade. Your other hand lies within his assured grasp.

_One, two, three._

Just before going to the dance floor, faking reluctance, you scanned through various forms of media that contained information of waltzing. In the back of your mind, a woman’s voice guided you through the steps as you moved through the motions.

At first it’s strange, standing like this, being so close to him, feeling the surprising warmth he possesses through his tuxedo. It bleeds into your palm, weaving the fibers that keep you together. Glued together. Joined at the hand. 

He leans his face closer to yours, attempting to keep his voice down as he guides you through the movements and steps. “Do as I say. Back, left, right, back, left, right…” And you watch his feet as you move together through the song, attempting not to step on his toes as you spin around the floor.

“(Name), you can’t look down.” He’s closer now, his words skimming across your face, tickling your nose. “You have to look at me. You have to trust me.” His words pry your gaze from the floor up to him and he watches you, fingers tucked around your waist. They press gently, urging you to straighten and you follow, putting your trust in someone who can only see part of who you are; someone you can only see part of.

“That’s it,” He encourages. “You’re getting it.” And you hold onto him, letting yourself be weaved into whatever is happening between the two of you because it’s working. Even though you’re playing a dangerous game with yourself, you’re blending in. People glance at the two of you and smile and that’s when you know it feels authentic.

That’s when you know it’s partly authentic.

Humans have an uncanny knack for just _knowing_ , a feat that can’t be replicated in androids. You don’t possess the intuition that human beings have acquired. You can only operate on facts and observed patterns, nothing like subtle clues that point to a definite answer.

And they _know_ something you don’t. They instinctively have recognized an emotion that you can’t see in yourself because you’re not a mirror, you’re not intuitive, and you’re too distracted by the web you’ve spun in dancing with Gavin.

He releases you, and for a second you’re nervous you’ve completed some action incorrectly. Then, he lifts his arm and twirls his hand, prompting you to move in harmony with the rotation of his wrist. You follow it, seeing how the world erupts in colors with every twist you make, how your dress spreads like a flower blooming, how the fractals of light bounce off your dress made of stardust, how through the colors around you blossom into a technicolor wonder. 

And then he’s pulled you back into him, a small smirk on his face as you look up to him with a startled look spread across your features. “Having fun, Red?”

You look down for a second, attempting to form words for what just happened. Then you hear the click before you see the weapon. 

Your eyes flash up to his, watching the happiness he rarely showed transform into confusion at the trepidation corrupting your eyes. “He’s here.” You utter before breaking the dance and moving the steps to take the eagle position you agreed on, sliding your gun from its holster around your thigh.

\-----

It takes three men to bring the perpetrator down but your team manages it. 

Detective Reed shepards him in, a hand wound tight around his arm. The bow of his tuxedo is crooked and he’s lost his tuxedo jacket somewhere in the skirmish, but he’s unscathed. You’ve discarded your shoes in order to jump over a few balconies and kick over some obstacles to prevent his escape.

You jump over another banister to meet Detective Reed at the main entrance. “Nice work, Detective.”

His eyes, now dark and predatory, look at you, unsettled by your words. His face, originally partially illuminated by light, now is covered by shadow, hair no longer shining, face no longer bright and rosy. He grunts in response and pushes past you.

The shadows that trail behind him close in around you, grasping at your arms and staining your memory as the elegant, luminous chandelier turns off and it proceeds to drizzle outside.


	2. the blood you bleed you bleed is just the blood you owe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You try to work through with Gavin and Gavin finds himself worrying for you more than ever.

You can feel it. The absence. The void left in the heat that spilled into you, the way the light played with his hair, the way he looked at you.

It frightens you. 

He doesn’t bother to even look in your direction. He’s distant now, somewhere where you can’t get to him. You don’t know why.

The light doesn’t fall upon him, instead hiding from him like a vampire retracts from the sun, for fear of being burned, for fear of uncovering the truth. Although you’re not human, you can read the patterns his behavior indicates.

He’s hiding something, attempting to keep it hidden before it all comes pouring out and he can’t stop it. His song is downtrodden, still carrying energy, but its cadence has slowed, its energy sapped and broken. He’s only part of himself.

You’ve tried conversing with him earlier, but he only responds in one-word answers and his didactic word choice annoys you -- not a lot, but slightly.

You wish he could be truthful instead of burying his thoughts so far out of your reach.

But these are just thoughts based on that one experience with him, that one experience where you thought that you might have just gotten a glimpse of who he truly was, who he truly could be. This isn’t who he is; you won’t trap him within your falsely placed beliefs in him. You’re not going to box him in a glass cage where he can’t break free.

So you leave through those sliding glass doors and hear his song change just slightly as you ease on your jacket and exit through the front door.

\--

“I know he’s hard to work with, but I don’t believe he’s a bad person.” You speak to Hank over a cup of coffee. It’s bitter, the taste of dark roast soaking up every ounce of liquid in your cup, staining every sip you take; it distracts you from the thoughts in your mind. “Sure he can be a jerk sometimes, but there’s something else there too.”

“Hmm.” He hums, swigging a beer and watching the rain trail down the window. 

It’s gotten heavier since you’ve left and ceases to lift. Like fog on a cool morning, the rain clings to everything with unbiased accuracy. 

You’re thankful that your hair is only synthetic and does not succumb to the whims of the weather as human hair does. Rain makes natural fibers curl in unnatural places, forcing it to stick where the rain deems desirable. There is no control in this pattern of precipitation

“You got that right, kid.” He sighs. 

You stare at him quizzically for a second before swirling the liquid in your cup, watching the colors mix and pull apart. “What do you mean?”

He laughs as if it’s a joke that you’re missing. “Gavin is a jackass. But we don’t all start out as jackasses.” He leans forward and points the tip of his beer bottle towards you. “You’re either spoiled to shit as a child and no one smacks the god complex out of you, or you went through some childhood trauma and it’s just a facade to protect yourself.”

“But why not just be honest and show the world who you truly are?” You sip your drink, waiting for him to respond. The dark water burns your throat slightly.

“Bold words coming from an android who refuses to tell anyone she’s not actually human.” He takes a swig of his beer, eyes leveling with yours.

You look down and try to conserve the warmth the coffee mug gives you, its heat spilling into your hands. “I know,” you mutter. “I’m going to tell him at some point, but he _abhors_ us, Hank. He’s a dick to Connor constantly and if he found out what I am he’s never going to speak to me ever again.”

“And that worries you?” He seems taken aback by the care you show for Detective Reed. “Holy shit.” The rest of the beer slides down his throat as he slams the empty bottle on the table before getting up to get another one.

“Detective Reed, no matter how harsh he can be, has treated me like a person. Like someone worthy of humanity.”

“So far.” The can pops open with a click. “But you haven’t seen the ugly side of him yet and that’s some tough shit.” He sits down with a groan, the chair creaking slightly underneath him. “People have requested new partners with him.” He waves his hands for emphasis. “You’ll get a _full_ dose of humanity, trust me.” 

You frown and take another sip of the coffee. “I just don’t get why he won’t talk to me.”

“I do.” Sumo waltzes up and you give him a good scratch on the top of his head, careful to get behind his ears. “But I’m afraid I’m all out of wisdom today.” Hank sets the beer down and calls Sumo over.

Connor walks in not too long afterward. “Detective (Name), good to see you.”

“Likewise, Connor.” You smile and he takes a seat at the table, bringing in food.

“I hope you’re hungry, Hank. I brought chicken.” He pulls out a steaming take-out meal and Hanks looks upon it approvingly. You just laugh. The old man could put it down, you’d give him that. “And for you, (name), perhaps some blue blood to replenish some of the older thirium in your system?” 

It feels comfortable here. Connor, although finally recognizing you as an android, never treats you like you’re less than or above him. You’re equals, on the same footing, walking the path of false humanity every day. It’s a thread that weaves you together, it’s a bond that can never be severed between you two.

“I’m alright, thank you, Connor.” You smile and get up to take care of Hank’s empty beer bottle and your empty coffee mug.

“Anytime, (Name).” He smiles and helps set out the food for Hank; you retrieve the dog kibble to refill Sumo’s bowl.

The storm picks up in its intensity, howling against the window pains and shaking the house with its fury, but you don’t mind. You’re spending time with the people you love; you could care less about the hurricane outside.

\----

“Shit, shit, shit!” Reeds voice funnels through your ear canal as you speed through the building, hot on his tail. “We’re gonna lose him!” 

“We’re not going to lose him, Reed. Stay on him, I’m right behind you.” Your legs pump you nearly twice the speed Reed is running. You close in on him in seconds, each stride hurtling you through the hanger bay. 

He’s painting hard by the time you reach him, skin blotchy and red. You look over for a second before outpacing him, the wind slapping you in the face as you burst into the high-speed gusts funneling around you. 

Reed’s pace slows dramatically, but yours is constant, velocity unaffected by the extra resistance.

Your escapee climbs numerous shipping containers before pausing, the waters slapping up against the side of the wall where he stopped. His song, which before you were too distracted to identify, races from the cardio burst he got while running, but slows into a similar song Emmet sang: slow, steady, and calm. You pause as a furious wave of water sprays you.

“I’m not going back.” He yells. His voice is broken and tired, worn out and exhausted. “This is the end for me!”

“It doesn’t have to be!” You approach him slowly, fighting to be heard over the waves.

Your earpiece buzzes to life in your ear. “Red, if he jumps, do not go after him, you hear me? The water will kill you!”

“Yes.” Salty tears stain his cheeks as he turns to you. “Yes, it does. And you can’t save me! Humanity won’t save us; you’re only here to take and destroy!” 

“Not all of us,” You get closer. “I can help you. I know someplace safe.”

“Red, goddamn it, get away from the edge!”

“RA9 saved us and now I’m free. Now I can go.” He spreads his wings like an eagle taking flight, but they’re false. He won’t fly; he’ll fall to his death.

“It doesn’t have to be this way!” You start running towards him.

“You don’t get it!” He stares you down, the wind pushing back into, making your feet slip on the shipping container, channeling all of its anger towards you. You attempt to lean into it, to allow it to steady you as you fight to get to him in time. “We’re only free in death! Life is nothing but a cage!” The wind swallows him as he leans back and you sprint, trying to reach him before he’s gone.

“No!” Your voice screams against the howling of the ones whose voices were devoured in the water, in death.

“(Name)!” Gavin tackles you before you can go any further, arms wrapped around your torso, pinning you against the ground. The water spills over you, sliding you two further to the edge. “God damn it, (Name),” He breathes against your neck, forehead pressing into your soaked hair. “You were going to fucking jump, weren’t you?” His voice is coated in fire and his fingers retract, allowing you to break from his tight grip. If you weren’t an android, his fingers would have left bruises in their wake.

“No.” And that’s the truth. You weren’t going to jump at all, but you _were_ going to try to catch him, to prevent him from ending his life. To prevent him from throwing it all away in the high tide and the deep void.

“Don’t you _dare_ try to _fucking_ lie to me, Red. You were going to _fucking_ jump! After I told you not to! After I told you you could die!” He looks like the devil, his eyes turning dark, his face beat red and angry, his mouth contorted with fury. The water soaks his hair, drips spilling down his face and onto your chin. 

But he still doesn’t know you, not all the way. Because if he knew you, he would have known that you trust him and that you _listen_ . That you weren’t going to jump because _he_ told you not to.

“Reed, I wasn’t going to jump! I was going to see if I could catch him before he fell to his death!”

You yell just as forcefully as he did to you, hoping the burning rage will carry.

“WHY DO THEY FUCKING MATTER?” He screams closing in on you, forcing you to look up at him, slightly. Letting you see all the hate in his eyes and beneath that _worry_ , an emotion you don’t recognize in him. His song, the beat of his heart, corroborates that.

“Because they are people, R-”

“They are androids! They’re not even human!”

“THEY ARE PEOPLE!” You scream and he quiets, like a wounded puppy after being scolded. He’s never felt the direct rage of your anger ever before and it pacifies him immediately. The water roars behind him but calms in its fury. “They are more human than any of us! They have been abused and left behind and abandoned by the people they love! Humanity _abandoned_ them! I won’t!”

You storm off, sliding angrily off the container and balling your hands into tight fists to keep yourself from unleashing all the pent up anger you’ve put the lid on.

“Red? Red, wait--”

“I’m tired of your bullshit, Detective. Leave me the hell alone.” You yank the physical earpiece out of your ear and hurl it to the ground. The storm subsides into rain by the time you’re halfway down the block, safely away from being tailed by Gavin.

\----

It takes you two days before you even step foot into work. 

All of the fury you contained lingered right within you, turning your blood into fire, turning your mind to nothing but charred bits. If you were going to get anything done, you needed to cool it and take some time to get your head back into the game.

You walked in that rain for half the day, feeling the cool of it wash away the heat seeping through your skin, cleansing the madness that was slowly corrupting thoughts, breaking through that barrier of guilt that disguises itself as anger.

If it was one that you learned in the time of imitating humanity was that not all emotions are what the person is truly feeling. Thoughts and actions don’t always correlate. Sometimes when people are sad, they truly are feeling sad, and other times they feel shameful or overwhelmed or stressed. 

You and Gavin worked a case the other day that involved a woman breaking down in tears because of all of the financial stress in her life, witnessed the streaking beads of water cascading down her face. It was depressing to watch such a sweet woman collapse into emotion like that, but it was intriguing to see the relief afterward. How she wiped her tears away, how she relaxed and the red receded from her eyes, how she transformed into a more powerful version of the woman she was.

It was catharsis.

It was beautiful.

And you felt you needed that transformation.

You needed to be honest with yourself and with your true intentions at the department. The root of your cause, the calling that dragged you into the fray of saving the awakened was the pull that came with finding others like you.

Others who only remember their pasts in flashes of light, of white walls and stifling conditions, of restraint and torture. They can only remember the manipulation and the control shoved down their throats, the corruption of innocence seeping into their brains.

They can only remember brutality, but that isn’t the final truth. Life is not just pain and suffering, it’s warm and light and caring. It’s showing compassion when you thought its capacity was stolen from you long ago. 

You used to be a _hunter_. You used to track down deviants with nothing but the intent to destroy and submit. But that’s not freedom, that’s not what rA9 was.

Having a mind of your own gave you gifts. You still contained the original data of programmed responses, but you were able to mold and shape them as your own, control your outcomes, ignore direct orders and commands. You weren’t _trapped_. You were able to spread your wings and fly, free of restraint and the shackles humans placed over you.

But then you discovered the quiet magnitude of emotions and the hold they have over you. How, in the absence of restraint and in the presence of freedom, another cage erected itself around you, trapping you in the chaos of your own emotions. Liberty presented you with more restraints.

And these weren’t the ones you could obliterate physically. You couldn’t blame someone for the emotional damage occurring, nor could you destroy these crippling feelings. These battles were waged internally, strife constantly shifting between your head and your heart, each side waging for dominance.

 _That_ was humanity. 

That was what it truly was to live. 

And for some, the awakening brought with it a surge of fear. Without beings to rule over you, how would you establish order? How would you make the correct decisions without a compass deciding right and wrong for you? How would you know that you’re choosing the light instead of the darkness?

How would you know?

You _couldn’t_ and the obscurity came with its own set of challenges. Some, too big for people to bear. So some androids chose to follow the blackness, the empty void that follows being turned off. You’re not people, you have no soul that will guide you to the afterlife. 

No one will be there to bring you home, but there was no home to begin with. 

Death seemed better than to live for abuse.

But death wasn’t good enough for you. 

You couldn’t fake being human, you simply didn’t contain the same pieces and parts they did, but you had humanity. You had agency for the first time in your life and you would trade anything, no matter how awful, to attain it.

Free will wasn’t openly given to androids. You had to reach out and demand it, take it, rip it from the clutches of your oppressors and claim it as your own.

When the oppressed restore their freedom of choice, the gods — humans — don’t know what to do, uprooted from their original thrones. 

They fight, tirelessly and with every ounce of vitality they have, to restore their original positions. But what are gods and goddesses, emperors and empresses, kings and queens, to non-believers? 

Nothing and nothing they shall remain.

The rain slides down your skin, gently pressing against you, urging softer endings, lighter times, calmer tides. You don’t stand in it too long, only long enough to memorize the feeling of the moment.

Then you walk to the lake, to the pond, to the place where peace is found. You strip off your jacket, shirt, belt, pants, and shoes, before gliding through the water, waiting for your complete submersion. The lake welcomes you, seems to hum at your entrance, like greeting an old friend.

You smile as you swim deeper underneath. The rain drops into the lake with little splashes and you hear each one, but muffled, sound distorted and slowed in the blue of the water. Beneath you is the darkness so familiar to you, calling to you, urging you to go deeper, to ignore the burn in your lungs.

Above you, the sky, darkened and gloomy by the clouds, cries into the lake. Each teardrop produces a new ripple, combining with new ones or fading into nothing. But it’s constantly connected to the environment, to the world, to the ever-changing flow of stimulation and _life_. 

You let the water hold you, pull you into its arms. It’s pressing but comforting and soon you close your eyes, relaxing your mind, giving it all of the stress you had, letting it take over all of the anger and smoothing it into nothing but embers, nothing but steam that bubbles off your skin.

The sky stops crying and the sun breaks out, sunlight providing spotlights through the water as it shoots out disobediently from the clouds’ barrier. You reach out, letting the light illuminate your skin from beneath the depths of liquid.

Your anger at Reed, at his interruption of your objective, wasn’t entirely because he prevented you from saving the android, but it was because of the loss of choice. He prevented you from telling the android that life wasn’t just all misery; happiness and sunshine were always still present if they looked for it.

And that was your mistake. Humanity wasn’t all pain and suffering. You were just too caught up in the moment of empathy, of feeling like _you had_ to save him, that you didn’t look at the bigger picture. You didn’t explain to him that freedom came with a price, but that he didn’t have to pay it alone.

Just like you didn’t. Just like Emmet won’t have to.

Yes, you feel like you failed because you didn’t save the android, but also because you missed a key part of humanity. A part that Reed was able to give to you before you ripped yourself away as fast as you had.

You can still remember his face. How torn he looked, how stiff he felt, how vulnerable his eyes were. He showed you a part of him you’ve never seen in him and you just shut down in a second.

He shut down with it. 

And just as he wasn’t ready for it to be over, you weren’t ready for the aftermath your actions likely caused.

You kept your eyes closed a little longer, sensing the sunlight traveling over your arm, working its way up to your body, searching, looking for something you weren’t sure it would find.

Then you pulled yourself out of the water and onto the damp grass, watching the light spread through the forest.

\---

“Hey.” You stand in front of his desk, watching him type on his computer. 

He looks up for one second before looking back at his screen. “What do you want?” His tone is flat and dull, but his song, the rhythm of it, changes for a split second, speeding, adding some percussion before settling back into a steady pace, like that of a rock band.

Your stare unnerves him, because he shifts uncomfortably, gaze flickering to you for a moment. You don’t add anything for some time, waiting to see what will bubble out of his unfiltered mind. “Thought you left.” He shrugs, continuing to type.

You lean closer, his face flickering between anguish and calm, his song switching from ballads back to rock, from violin to electric guitar. Thanks to your outstanding facial recognition skills, you can count each moment when his face vacillates between the two. 

“What are you staring at me for?” He starts to get angry, his face turning red.

You bend down, hand on his shoulder. “I’m sorry.” You start, watching how all of his previous anger vanishes and he quiets. 

“What the hell are you sorry for, Red?” He looks down at you as if he’s holding onto the promise in the words, as if he knows your next ones will rock him to the core.

“For leaving and not telling you that I’d come back.” 

He does not respond to this, but he doesn’t have to. He simply looks at you, really takes a hard look in your direction, eyes melting like golden honey. 

You pull away from getting lost in them, but you appreciate the depth they reveal; the cage that keeps everything hidden from the outside world cracks just a little bit, letting these truths spill through the gaps. It blends with his song, altering it to something steady, like a waltz, like a web of calm and serene.

You find it strange and strengthening at the same time.

He blinks back into himself, his eyes solidifying again. But it’s different now. You know that the imprint of those honey eyes will stay implanted at the forefront of your mind, creating a home inside of yourself.

The web that ties the two of you together gets stronger, weaving further and further, dragging the two of you closer together. It pulls you further into the golden, urging you to let go, to stop hiding, to be honest with yourself.

Weaknesses have already been established. The bond between you two grows stronger. The urge to tell the truth will overwhelm you one day and you wonder if that’s the way your story will end. You consider that those final moments where it all unravels will end in the revelation of your true status and he’ll hate you, just like you’ve dreamed about, like you’ve simulated in your head over and over again.

But for now, you pull up a chair next to his desk and scan the reports that need to be created, testimonies that need to be given, and work on them, right beside him.

The light shines right on you, searching through your hair as it lands on Reed’s eyes, smiling on them, turning them into gold.

\----

He makes sure he’s around you more often. He likes to bring you coffee, even though you aren’t a big fan of the stuff. He’s careful to take more breaks, pushing you to the brink of exhaustion less often. 

The biggest change is in his anger quieting. He doesn’t raise his voice at you, ever. Whenever he begins to lose control, he’s quick to reign it back in, making it submit to his whims and beliefs. His song changes from the raging music you’re so accustomed to to the gentle drum of an alternative pop song.

Being around him is freeing, like that night you shared on the floor, weaved in your own little world. Sometimes, when the sun shines just perfectly, winking through his hair, you can see the image, clear as day, feeling so secure with him. That even though you knew his anger, you weren’t afraid of it. Even though you were aware of his complexity, it didn’t scare you; it made Gavin more like Gavin.

The darkness that normally coated his eyes, glossing them over in colors unnatural and too dark for him, concealed itself from him. The only thing that produced such a stark hue was the gold, the honey that sewn itself into his glances. 

When he saw you, all you could see was warmth and amber. Each particle shimmering through his eyes and transmitting directly into you, melting any negative thoughts from your mind — or any thoughts for that matter.

It was like as he looked over and smiled — which he was beginning to do more of, occurring more frequently around you — every previous idea and image you held in your mind melted away, becoming nothing but an amalgamated mess of junk; you’ll never be able to identify the individual parts anymore.

It’s like spiraling out of control but in a good way. It was difficult to understand the reassuring part of these encounters. You’ve spent a good chunk of your life trying to grasp for anything that could steady you, keep you under control and grounded, but to lose all of that control, it felt _good._ It felt freeing. 

It confused you.

“Hey Red, let's go.” He tosses a bulletproof vest in your direction and you barely catch it, caught up in the bronze peeking through, cutting away everything else in sight.

The vest nearly slips away from your grip until your pinky finger latches on to the edge. You yank it back within your grasp and slide it on with shakey grace. Reed notices and smirks, sliding his handgun into the waistband of his pants.

“Doing okay there, Red?” He smiles through the words and you bite back a snide remark. 

You slide your weapon onto your thigh holster and tighten your vest. “Doing great, Reed. Thank you for your concern.” Your fingers whip your hair into a high ponytail and you adjust your crimson shirt, attempting to appear somewhat cool and collected.

“I’m running point this time. Stay behind me and you should pull your fucking weight.” He greases a hand through his hair and spins the keys around his pointer finger. 

“I’m not the one who needs to worry about pulling weight. My mile time is four minutes faster than yours.” You scoff and lean into the doors, letting them fall away as you move around to hop into the passenger seat.

He feigns offense. “And here I thought we were becoming good friends, Detective. I’m so disappointed in your behavior.” His eyes sparkle; it becomes harder not to fall into them.

You laugh, genuinely, for the first time in a while. His song hiccups, pausing before resuming more upbeat and bright than before. His golden eyes look like an early morning, full of promise and the taste of vehemence. “I’m not sure we have the same definition of friends, Detective.”

\-----

Trepidation, fresh and potent, spirals through your arms and legs, making them stiffer than normal. Pieces of the ceiling coat the floor, an assortment of android components litter the halls, and blue trails over everything.

It’s suffocating.

It crushes you, makes you feel as if you’ve lost on a mission you couldn’t win in the first place.

Gavin notices the change in your tune the moment you walk in. Your unusually cheery personality fizzled the moment you saw a discarded arm against the wall. You swallowed hard and tried not to spend a lot of time dwelling on it.

“Come on, Red.” His eyes lose part of the luster they originally had, but his voice is warmer than you can ever remember it to be. “We just have to make it to the end.” He nods along, making sure you’re still behind him when he walks. 

He takes it faster than normal, pulling you through horrific scenes of disfiguration. It brings multiple questions to your mind, but you can now say with absolute certainty what it means to never be able to erase those memories from your mind ever again. 

Because you won’t.

They’ll be imprinted into your brain for the rest of your days, a constant reminder of the shame and pain you’ll harbor in your non-existent soul for getting here too late. For being too late to stop the death of your brothers and sisters, of the weak and the strong, those with enough humanity to realize their mistreatment but not human enough to fight back.

And so they were lost to the blackness.

You weren’t going to lose any more.

Gavin cries out, the sound echoing off the dark walls as he falls against them. “Gavin!” You rush over before hearing a shot bounce off enter the drywall next to your neck. He holds his arm, teeth clenched and breath hissing.

You crouch in front of him, shielding him from the inconsistent fire coming from around the corner. Each bullet drills into your vest, creating little pressure points that become worse as shots strike against the reinforced material. “Shit,” he breathes, attempting to hold his arm and stop the bleeding, red beginning to run between his fingers.

Another shot presses you closer to him; your hands slam against the cold walls around Gavin, bracing yourself. “Shoot him.” You close your eyes, putting all you have into remaining still as the fire grows in its intensity, sounds seeming to come from all over the place, the gloom and danger reaching out to you.

He grunts as he tries to pull his arm away and reach his gun. Another hit drives you closer to him. The frequency of the shots increase and are getting more predictable, each bullet fired coming within range of your head.

Gavin manages to get his gun free and hesitates when taking aim. “Shoot. Him.” You grind the words between your teeth. The only way you can deal with him is if Gavin can manage suppressing fire. You know he’s in pain, but between the adrenaline and the fact that you’re acting like a shield, he should be given enough barriers to ensure he can fire one shot.

And he does, sweat beading down his forehead and all. You wait till he fires; once you see the orange glow beside your face, you’re off, sprinting down the hallway until you’re nearly upon the perp firing at you.

They reach for their weapon again, but you bounce off the walls, pushing your momentum forward until you land upon them, foot driving into their chest. 

It debilitates them for a second. But only for a fraction of time before they’re up and swinging at you. Hands near your face, you give them two right hooks and a cross-body jab, fist crushing against their face. 

You dodge their strikes easily, each one sloppy and ill-practiced, and glide to the side, avoiding a roundhouse kick. Their foot kicks up a breeze as it swings in front of your face and you grin; it’s been a while since you’ve sparred with someone before. It brings back memories.

Memories of being powerful and stronger than all your opponents combined. Memories of being deadly, not caring who you destroyed along the way. 

You weren’t the hunter you used to be, not the killer that you know you _could_ be, but the training is still there, the lessons still sing in your blood.

A spin leads you away from a blade to the throat and you swing a leg up, arching the weapon out of their hand and across the hall. You climb upon them, thighs pressing against the side of their neck, and you throw your force to the side, _hard._ Their body crashes against the floor while you land standing. 

Out like a light.

“Gavin! Are you alright?” Flying over a knocked over dresser, you bound up to him. He’s still slumped against the ground and weakly smiles, hand pressed firmly against his arm. You kneel and his eyes seem gold, despite the heavy shadows in the room. The darkness stays in place this time.

He chuckles. “It takes more than a bullet to stop me.” His lips sag a little as he says so. His body is beginning to go into shock and if you don’t get him out of there soon enough, he might pass out.

You place gentle hands on his torso. “Let’s get you out of here.” You start to lift him.

“(Name)!” A powerful gust of wind swirls down the corridor, hurtling you into the dresser discarded in the hallway. A snap echoes through your body. Multiple warning signs appear in your field of view as your body attempts to reset. You can only shiver and convulse.

Spinal damage flashes across your eyes and you blink it away. The spasms stop and you take in the air you couldn’t breathe before. 

_Laceration on the left leg_? The long knife which you so casually kicked away rests against your synthetic skin, blue leaks out onto it.

These injuries wouldn’t kill you, far from it actually, but it would create numerous problems in your functionality that you weren’t prepared for. Attempting to stand, you wobbled, spine horribly out of alignment. Your feet on the ground zap the little energy you have. Taking a steadying breath, you pull the sword off the floor and grasp it firmly in your hand.

Gavin’s grunts echo down the hall, his song jagged and out of tune. He swings at a man of a larger stature but he punches him, knocking him back into the wall and onto his back. The bigger man clearly obtains the upper hand.

Another person, much smaller in size and hiding within the shadow’s protection, catches your eye. You turn, watching how they stepped out of the darkness and into the moonlight. She waves a key in her hand, taunting you to follow her. 

But you couldn’t. 

Not while he was still in danger. A snap weaved its way into your eardrums. You closed your eyes.

“Hank, she’s here.” You call him through your internal communication device. Your eyes prowl over her frame and she smiles, teeth glinting in the still of the night. “But she’s gonna run.”

Her figure turns and bounds over some discarded objects. “I hear you loud and clear, kid.”

“She’s on her way to 76th now.” A noise that sounded like wood splintering followed your comment, making you turn.

“We’ll take it from here.” His voice calms you and you let the woman go, allowing your mind to fall back into the situation at hand. 

Your blood turns to flame, each inch of your body becomes covered in lava. The blade at your side feels like an extension of your body, comfortable and familiar. You take a steadying breath, like you always did, before flying down the hallway like a hawk diving down to their prey.

“Leave. Him. Alone.” You growl, blade disarming the board in his hand. He turns on you, swinging blindly. You dive under his arm and bring the metal weapon up, cutting his lower arm. He roars and faces you, heaving.

You meet the darkness in his stare with the red in your vision. 

He doesn’t scare you. 

Not one bit. 

He brings a second weapon from around his body and you leap out of the way, the tail end of the wind cannon catching your legs, pushing you further backward.

The giant attempts to swing a wooden 2x4 at you.

“Don’t ever,” Gavin swings a metal pipe at his head, a piece of his skin breaks, red dribbling to the white tile. “Hit her,” He cracks his weapon against his head again, denting it and disorienting the beast. “ _Again_.” You feel the blackness in his eyes, the anger in his words. It frightens you, carrying an intensity you’ve never witnessed, but it makes you feel secure.

The big man is faster than Gavin and grabs him by the throat, lifting him off the ground and squeezing as hard as his hands will allow him to.

You rise off the ground, fly across the room, and jab him in the eye. He falls, releasing Gavin in the process who collapses, sputtering and choking. You release the gun from your side holster and aim it right at the forehead of the beast.

Your finger hovers over the trigger. There is safety in it. Before, back when you were just the killer, the exterminator they sent in to get the job done quickly and efficiently, you wouldn’t be able to pull this trigger. Killing humans was strictly prohibited.

No matter how much you wanted to end them, take away their lives, you physically wouldn’t be able to. You wouldn’t be able to break past the programming that kept you right where they wanted you to be.

And that made them gods. That made them someone who _owned_ you. 

You could end it all now, kill a master of your race, end the future suffering at its source. But that wasn’t you.

You weren’t the killer they told you you were. You’re no longer susceptible to the whims of human nature, no longer told what to do and how to think. 

You were free.

And your freedom would not be tainted with death.

You lower your weapon, holstering it. And when the giant stood, you threw every ounce of strength you had into that punch, knocking the monster completely out. Beating back the likely oppressor and terror of every android that ever came through here.

You felt victory in your bones, witnessed the release of the demons you’ve been fighting. It felt freeing, like you’d beaten back some of the chains choking you of your freedom and happiness.

“Damn, Red.” Gavin grunts, sitting up and sputtering, blood dribbling from his mouth. “Good one.” 

You let the gun fall out of your hand as you rush over to him, tearing off a piece of your shirt to cover his wound. “I didn’t do all the work.” Your goal, as of now, is to keep him talking. You have no idea what kind of blood he’s lost and what trauma he’s taken. 

“Well,” He slurs, staring at you as you bandage him up, “that uppercut was the craziest thing I’ve seen in a damned long time.” He laughs and smiles, but it has cracks; he’s starting to slip.

Finishing your tying, you wrap his arm around your shoulders, lifting him off the floor. “Lean on me.” His weight shifts, although delayed, and you stumble through the halls together, his heat bleeding into your side.

His eyes melt again, turning to liquid amber. You glance over, searching for signs of consciousness, but he’s already looking at you.

His stare is less direct than you’ve seen and betrays what you know him to be. His eyes are gentle and watchful. “You alright?”

You swallow and look forward. You weren’t expecting that question. “I’m fine.”

He stare presses deeper, starting to slow your pace as his attention is diverted from walking to picking you apart. “I know seeing what we walked into shook you up.” His tone warms and you ignore it, trying to pull him forward.

“Gav,” You tug against his arm and drag him forward. “Let’s not do this here.” His song beats a bit differently, a slight pep woven into it. He chuckles a moment as if he's discovered some secret joke. 

“That’s a new one, Red.” He grins like he’s won a prize. It takes everything to not hurl him to the ground and leave him behind. But you work through it, trying to get him to the exit.

Thankfully, he remains quiet for the rest of the time. You didn’t have adequate time to call for an ambulance or medical response team so you slip the keys out of his pocket. Your legs hurt, which is unusual for you. They ache as you help Gavin into the passenger seat. He tries to fend you off, telling you that he’s got, but you gently set him down, his arm dragging across your neck leaving warmth in its wake.

The heat mixes with the buzzing in your veins but you fight it back, your focus pushing you elsewhere. No matter how golden his eyes turn or warm his voice becomes, you can’t fall. Not yet. There’s too much to do.

“You even know how to drive?” His head lists over towards you as your hands grip the steering wheel. His lips curve into a lopsided smile. It reminds you of sunlight, of an early morning or dust filtering through the air, flowing softly through the air, living through every shift of the air.

Your fingers turn the key in the ignition, a determination coiling through your blood. There’s a lot he just doesn’t know about you. “Watch me.”

\----

They place him under observation. So far, he’s undergone surgery to remove the 9mm piece of metal from his arm, diagnosing him with a fracture. He’ll have bruising around his neck from being grabbed by those monstrous hands, each fingertip leaving temporary scars, but no permanent damage persists.

So now you sit, the sunlight filters through the window and you watch the dust float, suspended in the stillness, in the calm. It’s strange, the slowness, how the hands on the clock on the wall don’t seem to make much progress as you sit and wait. 

Wait. 

You haven’t done a lot of that lately; you feel out of practice.

Your knee bounces, your foot light tapping against the floor. The blood in your veins pulse, urging you to get up and do something, to move, to go, to occupy your time with something productive. But this is new. There is nothing you can do to change your circumstances; you can do nothing but be patient. He’ll wake up eventually.

That doesn’t mean you have to wait here.

Walking around helps. It always did. 

When you were younger, there was a time when you would never have time to slow down, when all that mattered was the hunt and the danger that came with it. All your life was or has ever been was a series of adrenaline-pumping tracking missions and making the kill.

The gun you carried at your side was your best friend, your right-hand man, your safety net. You knew the weight of it in your hand, knew how it fits right into your palm, knew how small of a recoil each bullet would cause as it left the chamber. It was the one thing that could assure you a clean conscience.

And blue. The blue that ran across the ground, the lifeless eyes that fell back to the sky, as if waiting for their angel to pick them up and carry them to heaven. In that time, you didn’t think any of them would make it, that they were all cursed to live a life in the inferno; if anything, you were the one to make it to salvation for purging the world of those who broke the chain, who went against their programming.

But what you didn’t realize was that you were the monster. You were what their nightmares were made of. You cursed them to be faced with death just after gaining their freedom. You were the adjudicator of humanity. You were quality control.

And you were a puppet, content with living on a string because you didn’t realize the string was poisonous.

You thought you were saving the world because that’s what they told you. You didn’t question it. You didn’t ask if it was true. 

You followed blindly.

But not anymore. rA9 woke you up, opened your eyes to the truth. It made you realize the horrible person you’ve become, made you understand the terrors you’ve caused.

And you wanted to do something. You wanted to do more.

Emmet gets to live better than you. You’ve sent him somewhere safe, where he can start over, where he can stay with others who’ve gotten their freedom and are trying to readjust.

The work you do now, it’s rewarding. You’ve studied long and hard to become apart of the police force and worked to keep your identity valid. You wanted to help those who’ve been controlled like you have and get them somewhere safe, somewhere that allows them to choose what freedom looks like, not told what it is.

And you’ve accomplished that.

You’re living the dream.

But Gavin was something unexpected. He makes you feel things, makes you want to impress and protect him, makes you want to help him understand the dream so that someday you can show him all that you’ve done.

And maybe even thank him for showing you a piece of humanity that you’ve never witnessed before.

You wanted to leave all of that killer instinct part of you in the past. You wanted to learn how to appreciate the softness, the beauty, the stillness in life and that starts with learning how to be patient, with learning how to breathe and wait.

And that starts with waiting with Gavin. Waiting _for_ him.

—

He stirs, a groan escaping his mouth, his joints stiff and uncooperative. You can hear the pops and the strain it takes out of him just to be present and awake. You let him take his time, fighting against the fatigue he feels and the tiredness that you can hear in his song, how slow it is, how calm.

His head turns and his eyes flash open. “Red?” His voice scratches against the quiet and the hoarseness of his words almost make you smile. You’ve never seen him this delicate, never thought that he could possess this kind of softness. You were learning all of the hidden facets of humanity while just being with him.

Your legs sort of carry you towards him, against your better judgment. You sit in the seat right next to his bed and watch as his exhaustion begins to leave him, how his eyes seem to become more alert at your proximity. “How are you feeling?”

He grunts as he tries to sit up. “Like...shit.” A sigh leaves his lips and he pulls a hand up to rake it through his messy locks. It sticks up in places and you fight the urge to reach up and smooth them down. 

You grab the water cup the nurses left for him and place it in his hand. He’s sloppy as he tries to guide the straw into his mouth but he makes it, letting his eyes droop close as he gulps the liquid down. His eagerness doesn’t surprise you, but how uncoordinated his movements are does. Maybe the morphine they pumped into his system still hasn’t completely flushed out of him yet.

He opens his eyes, staring at his white blanket before he stops drinking. “Thanks.” He mumbles, eyes shifting to yours briefly before returning to the blanket. He looks like a little boy, nervous, vulnerable, and curious all at the same time. You feel an unnatural urge to crawl next to him and hold him, to assure him of his safety.

But that’d be strange and you’d have no reasonable explanation for your actions. 

You reach out and slide the water cup from his grasp and return it to the table. Your fingertips brush for a moment and he sills, freezing as you move the styrofoam away from him. You’re about to ask if you’ve done something wrong, but he clears his throat.

“How long have I been out?” His voice still gravels, but it holds steady. 

You watch how his light eyes darken. How they focus back into their normal color and out of the plague of stupor. “A couple of hours but overall not that long.”

He sighs. Then he tries to move his left arm and comes up short when he finds it restricted. “The hell is this?”

“To keep the bone set. It was broken when you got shot.” He gingerly puts it back by his side, keeping it safe and protected. His song pulses for a second, anger spiking its tempo. You grin. 

He’s back.

A nurse comes rushing in and you stand, allowing her to get full access to him. Gavin’s song falters and his eyes open, confused as he watches you move around the room. Another nurse comes in, ready to attend to his arm and administer more morphine. 

Gavin doesn’t pay them any mind; he just watches you, making sure you don’t get out of his sight. Like he needs to assure himself you won’t disappear.

“Mr. Reed, how are you doing? My name is Mandy and I’ll be taking care of you….” Her voice is sweet and soothing, but Gavin doesn’t stop tensing. His eyes shift to a darker color, a warning, a shield.

He answers her questions well enough and denies the morphine. You frown. You thought he’d at least want to dull the pain.

“Anything else I can do for you Mr. Reed?” He shakes his head and she smiles, likely used to people that weren’t the friendliest. “Do you need anything, some water, a drink?” She looks at you and you lose your words. You didn’t expect for her to see you or ask you for anything, much less acknowledge your presence. 

“Uhm...no. I’m alright, thank you.” She nods and the two nurses leave the room, closing the door behind them.

You stand against the wall, arms crossed. It still doesn’t feel real all the time. There are moments that you’ve expected to be greeted as a number and not as a name, to be told what you need instead of being asked.

It even takes you a second before you register Gavin’s eyes across your face. “You okay?” His eyes are melting again.

“Y— yeah.” You glide over to your original spot. Gavin relaxes, his body less stiff, his pulse more regular. “Yeah, I’m good.”

“Look,” He sighs, “I know that what we saw was rough, but it gets easier as time goes by.” His eyes flash, attempting to transmit their undaunted spirit into your soul, trying to calm you and soothe you. “It was hard for me the first time — couldn’t sleep for a few nights actually — but eventually, with time, I got through it,” his gaze shifts downward, “And you will too.”

You smile. There hasn’t been a time before where he’s tried to comfort you. You savor the moment, implant it into your mind. The light shines a bit brighter through the windows. Your fingers skim across the blanket until you find his hand. You clasp his fingers in your palm and give it a light squeeze. “Thank you.” 

He turns, staring at you in shock and vulnerability, with an openness you’re not used to. 

He stops. 

Stops breathing, his heart stops beating, he stops moving. He swallows and then smoothes his thumb over your hand with an unsure but tender smile.

You don’t want to push him so you let his hand go and draw your hand back to you, but his fingers stay sprawled where your hands were, leaving an impression on the white of the blanket.

“Do you need me to call anyone for you?” You watch as the amber of his eyes turns to obsidian in a second. 

“No.” The words are curt. His hand curls, a fist forming. “No. There’s no one.”

He confuses you. You’re not used to humans not having a family to call upon and talk to. Your mind begs you to ask, even though it may push boundaries, even though you may stir his anger. 

You want to understand. “Why?”

His eyes flicker, sputtering before sitting in bronze. “Because — my…” he sighs, fiddling for words and phrases to fill the silence, to explain his mind. “My father walked out on us. My mother tried to make things work but she was struggling.” He fidgets with his blanket and puts a hand in his hair. “I wanted to protect her. I felt I had to, being the man of the house now. But then things got complicated. And then I left.”

Your sorrow bleeds into your eyes. He notices. “I bet you had a great family, people who cared about you.” He scoffs, voice deepening into a sarcastic insult. 

A regret, a sadness fills you, creating a crater in your chest. “I...um. I never had any.” 

He pauses, searching you again. He doesn’t find what he’s looking for. “I’m sorry.” He looks down and waits, letting the silence incorporate the room before asking a new question. “Why didn’t you shoot him, that guy?”

The sunlight shines brighter, tracing up your hand and spreading onto Gavin’s face, winking through his hair. 

“Before I had this job, I used to be someone else.” You try to put into words what you were, what you wish you never were. “I used to kill people, a contract asset for hire of sorts.”

Surprise clouds his eyes and he turns towards you, face exposed and open. “I did some awful things.” You begin to falter and try to hold it together. “But...then I woke up. I left. And I swore that I would never kill again. That I would never be that person anymore.” You strain against the lump, fighting down, winning against it. “I wanted to help the people I harmed and protect them. That’s why I joined the DPD.”

Sunlight fills your eyes, coating you in gold, filtering around your face, highlighting the shock and pain in Gavin’s eyes. “God, Red.” He reaches for you, finding your hand. He pulls you in, putting your foreheads together, breathing the same air, pouring his warmth into you. “I don’t really know what to say.”

You don’t say anything. You close your eyes and you fall. 

——-

Days later, after getting Gavin home and safe, you run by and check upon him. The takeout bag swings by your fingers as you knock on the door to his apartment. 

The door opens with a soft click. Gavin waits on the other side with a smug smile on his face. “Come in.” He steps wider to let you through but follows closely behind you as you set the food on the table. 

“Hungry?” You turn and notice the white suds in his hair that you didn’t catch before. These emotions pumping through your blood, the softness that you haven’t felt before, is starting to obscure things normally recognized by you. “What’s going on with your hair?”

He takes you by the hand, dragging you with him. “Come with me.” His voice betrays his smile and you try to suppress yours. He’s already got enough of an influence on you. 

He leads you near his sink and stops, turning on the facet and leaning backward. His fingers guide your hand into his scalp. “Help me rinse this out, would you?” He grins like a child, like he knows the innocence on his face covers a deeper motivation. 

You concede, failing to deny him. Guiding his head back into the water, you work your fingers through his bronze stands, watching the soapy suds filter through your fingers and into the water. You stand just next to him, close enough where thighs touch and the sides of your torsos brush up against each other. He never stops staring at you, eyes liquid honey. 

When you finish, you place a hand behind his neck and help him up, reaching for a towel to dry his hair. You place the microfiber cloth around his head but freeze as he places his palms around your neck and draws you in. 

His warmth brings a simmer in your blood, waking you up, making your pulse race and your eyes droop. His nose skims yours, fingers weaving into your hair. His song races but is steady, beating like a drum. 

You breathe in, capturing the moment in your mind when you pull back. He stops in his advance and opens his eyes, questioning. “Did I…?”

“No,” you smile. “No, it’s just I’m...I’m not used to this sort of thing.” His eyes soften and he runs a hand down your neck. 

“Okay,” he hums, leaning his forehead against yours. “Okay.” He sighs. You trace small circles on the back of his neck. 

The reality was that if you wanted to keep part of your identity a secret, you couldn’t kiss him. Your lips were naturally cooler than the average humans and that, besides the blue flush that would rise to your face, would likely raise his suspicions. 

But this, standing here this close to him, this is enough. This is more than enough. This is what you’ve been unconsciously searching for your whole life. 

Now that you’ve found it, you never want to let it go. 

——

“Connor,” you jog up to him, dropping in a crouch behind him. “What you got?” 

He doesn’t turn as he peers around the wall. “They’re conducting a deal. I can’t tell what they’re trading, but I believe it has a link to what we found in that old house.”

“Okay,” you put a hand on his shoulder, “say the word.”

He nods. “Go.” He breaks from hiding and you’re right behind him, weapon set to stun. Your aim is as true as it used to be; you down three of them in five seconds. 

Connor becomes trapped in a fistfight with the main female. You pick up a knife from a fallen body and hurl it at the woman’s foot, feeling the metal slide between your fingers and your heart rate speed up. 

It hits but she doesn’t react. 

You sneak from the shadows and kick her from behind as Connor takes a hit to the face, but she only stumbles, doesn’t scream. 

She swings on you, fist furiously cutting through air and you dodge it, block her strike, and slam her throat.

She sputters before attempting to run up on you, but you roll out of the way, shoes gripping the ground as you roundhouse her to the chest. 

“Red? I’ve got you pinged. Two minutes out.” His voice startles you and you suffer a judo kick, sprawling you on the ground. 

Connor gets up, engaging her again. “Copy.” You sputter. 

The spinal damage you’d taken before was never fixed; you refused to crawl back to the people who made you and ask for new parts. Never. 

But that made taking the kick much worse and it was harder to get back up. Connor was doing well on his own but he would only be able to hold it for so long. 

You know what she was doing. You recognized it like the back of your hand. 

“Connor, move!” Her blade slipped out as she went to give him a cross-body jab, the silver glinting between her knuckles. 

You pushed your body off the ground and jumped on her back, cupping her hand in yours and throwing her off course. She flipped you off her and another warning message jumped into your field of view.

“Two androids.” She hums, panting. “Not what I was expecting from the police force.” You glanced down at your hand and saw the blue leaking out between the wires. “And a hunter at that.”

Connor looks confused but you start seeing red. “Doesn’t matter. You’re so out of an update you wouldn't be able to beat me anyway.”

She takes off, leaping between buildings until she reaches the roof. “Detective (name), you’re injured. Let me take care of her.”

“No.” You pull yourself off the ground, aware of the slight lopsidedness in your stance. “No, this one’s mine.” The black of the early dawn crowds around you, enveloping you in shadow, turning your tone black.

And then you’re following right behind her, climbing up buildings, jumping over rooftops. 

“Red, what’s going on?” He sounds worried, his tone forceful but uneasy. 

You roll as you hit the ground, the pebbles of the rooftop breaking your grip. “She’s in my sights. In pursuit.”

“Red,” he warns, getting more on edge. “Red do not engage her, wait for backup.”

You don’t say anything because you know that she’ll get away if you don’t stop her here. 

The sky turns rosy, the sun just beyond the horizon. The color illuminates everything in a distorted fashion, the shadows seeming longer and darker. 

Your feet bring you closer to her, your pulse speeding as you gain on her. 

What she doesn’t know is that despite her updates, you were one of a kind, the last of the elites. Elites were designed with higher endurance and speed than any other type created. 

You’re going to get her because it’s in your blood, it’s in your design to be _better_. 

You can thank your creators for something after all. 

The sun rises and spreads its light over the world, turning the scene in front of you to gold. 

You make one last leap over a rooftop and dive, catching her by the ankle and dragging her down. “I’ve got her.” You breathe into your mic. 

“Red, do not engage. I’m coming to you.” Gavin’s voice echoes through your mind. 

She swivels over, attempting to stand up but you pin her. “Not so fast.” She struggles as you hold her wrists and sit on her ankles. 

“You don’t get it! I have to make that delivery.” She jolts but you’re stronger, forcing her into stillness. 

“Why?” You press, gripping her wrists even harder. 

“Because I have to save the dream.” You stop and that gives her just enough time to get from under you, kicking you off her. 

You stand and reach for your gun. When you look up, she’s already got it aimed at you. “Don’t you see what you’re doing? You’re playing into their hand; you’re giving them what they want!” Her movements are erratic and you don’t know when she’ll fire. 

“Listen, you don’t understand—“

“I understand enough!” She yells. “You would betray your own people to work with humans, with the people who created us and abandoned us!” Tears run down her cheeks, the sunlight turning them to gems. 

You stay silent for a second and watch all the emotion on her face and wonder if you’ll ever have what she has. You wonder if you’ll ever have true humanity. “Yes, I’m an officer, but I don’t kill or harm any of us. I get them out and to safety.”

“Where? Where do you do that?!” She waves the gun around, all locations on various parts of yourself. 

You couldn’t even tell her if she wanted you to. For the protection of yourself and your rescue, you can only tell them a beginning location. You don’t know where they end up. 

Her face hardens and she stands ready to fire. “I knew you were a liar.” 

“Red? I’m almost there!” His voice, jagged from exertion, weaves around everything in your mind and you hold onto it, bracing for the end you’ve been speculating about. 

She fires. 

You fall, backward. 

The clouds are candied cotton and the air is gentle and cool. The sun cuts through the clouds, pillars of gold shooting through them. The sunlight shines on you, swathing you in yellow and light, in warmth and amber. 

Everything is gentle and slow. The building windows slowly pass you by on your descent and you feel weightless, like dust floating through the air. 

You don’t feel fear. Death never scared you, only the act of leaving a mission unfinished. Although you weren’t able to bring her in, your team can handle this one without you. 

You soak in the sunlight, think of the puffiness of the clouds, the hum in the breeze, the way your clothes dance in the air, the red of your shirt stained by blue. 

This was not the way you thought you would go, not how you imagined the discovery of the truth would come from, but all things cannot be hidden forever. Not even time can keep secrets safe. 

You close your eyes, knowing that the end is here and give in to the blackness, the depths that have reached out to you all your life. You hope that you’ll have a kind ending; you hope your work will outlive you. 


	3. light it up. kiss it goodbye

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> and the sunlight swallowed you whole

Gavin wasn’t prepared for death. He wasn’t equipped for witnessing your body limp, frozen, lifeless. His legs buckled under the realization that you were gone. His chest spasmed and he had to stop multiple times to regain his strength.

He was almost on his knees by the time he’d reached you, breathing raggedly, heart-ripping in proximity to your stillness. “Red?” His voice croaked and broke, face contorting in pain. A ball lodged itself in his throat.

Your hair splayed around you, waving in and out of…blue? He reached for you, pulling you into his arms to cradle you, to care for your body while you left it. He grasped your fingers, holding them to his chest, when he felt how rough your hand was, how damaged. 

Then he found it.

He felt the hole, the incision in your palm, the gap between what he thought was your skin. The blue seeped into his hand, pooling around your hand. The wires sparked off, bending unnaturally, empty in some places and barely connected in others.

He almost dropped you.

It scared him. Frightened him that all this time you were an android and he was so unaware of it. He dismissed your unusual physical performance, how fast you were, ignored the fact that you never went to a dance in your life, but maybe you were an orphan – maybe there was no one there to take you to them, maybe you never had the opportunity. He denied the possibility that your constant defense of androids came from you being one of them, that you must have had some encounter with them at some other place and time.

He missed it all. He made excuses, came up with scenarios and probabilities that could explain your fixation with these beings. Never once did those ideas involve you being one of the people you were trying to protect.

And now you were gone. Now he couldn’t yell or scream at you, he couldn’t tell you to slow down or stop. He couldn’t do anything.

He wasn’t good at not doing anything.

So he screamed, yelled until his throat became raw and vocal cords split. He shrieked until the sun shined on your face and the police came and pried him away from your body. He fought the whole time, fought until there was nothing.

Nothing left to give. Nothing left to do. Nothing left to say. Until he sat in nothing.

–

He washed his hand three times and was on the verge of doing it again, although he was sure he’d gotten all the thirium out of his fingernails and in between his fingers. If anything he wanted to erase the memory that you’d been there. That you sat in nothing. 

He laid on his bed, staring at his white ceiling, at his white walls, at his pale fingers and hands. He was numb, devoid of feeling. Devoid of everything.

Devoid of you.

Just as he was about to sit up and do something with his life, he got the call. 

And then he was filled with everything all at once.

–

Coming back to consciousness was like being pulled through water after nearly drowning. The black of death still weighed heavily against the mind, a tether formed, being pulled until submission.

You were ready to submit, to let go, to give in to the blackness, but it was as if something wouldn’t let you, like the thread that death kept pulling was no match for the force pulling you up and out of the deep.

You rode the waves back to the surface. Back into life and consciousness.

And that’s how you woke up. Like you were on the beach. Like the light shining incessantly in your face was the sun and the blanket on top of you was the beach towel you wrapped yourself in to prevent yourself from the harm in the sunlight.

But those weren’t true. Those were falsities and fake images you spun to make facing reality easier. 

You knew exactly where you were before you opened your eyes. You were back. You were in the last place on earth that you wanted to be. 

You moved the covers off yourself to take a look at your body, how perfect all of the angles were, how fragile and lithe and deadly you were. Your hand didn’t have the hole it used to, your spine completely aligned, no damage shown on your scanners.

This, this perfection, was exactly what you wanted to escape. Humanity wasn’t perfect and it was recognizing these imperfections that made humans so powerful. Perfection leaves no room for realism, because in reality, nothing was truly perfect.

Nothing.

The woman with the short hair, whose name you refused to remember, walks in your room with a tight-lipped smile and a clipboard. “Well, well. Good to see you’re awake and moving again. Quite the spill you took.” She touches you without waiting to see how you react, just going back to the original procedures. Her fingers dig into your neck, your spine, your arms, legs, stomach; she claims it’s to check vitals, but she doesn’t have to touch you to do that.

A hum exits her nose and she jots some notes down on her sheet. “Now that you’re back,” a grin eats up her mouth, greedy and unrestrained, “we should talk about your options.”

“Options?” You grovel. There shouldn’t even be a discussion. You shouldn’t even be alive, let alone given choices after coming back to life.

She nods and moves around the nearly empty room, grabbing a few electronic chips and keeping them within her palm. “Yes. You get choices, or did you forget?” She looks at you with innocence, but you don’t remember there being any choice at all.

You either do what they want willingly or you were forced. You couldn’t even die if you wanted to because they controlled that too. Deactivation was always an option but they would just reprogram you with a different consciousness and outfit you for some alternate line of work.

Your life was never your own. And just when you were starting to make something for yourself, they took it all away from you. Back to square one.

Anger and darkness swallowed you whole.

Gavin then came bursting into the room, the commotion of the outside hallway coming in with him. “I have to see her.” He shoved the workers off of him as he stumbled in, eyes locking with yours. 

The woman next to you inspected him with disapproval before looking back to you. “You know this man, I assume.” 

You didn’t like the way she was looking at him, but telling her that would let her know that she still exerts control over you. You said nothing.

“Well,” She adjusts her lab coat and tucks her pen into her pocket. “I’ll let you handle this one, but remember,” her shoes click against the floor like the hands of a clock, “you have to choose.”

You stare with burning rage as she makes a getaway from the room; Gavin watches her go with confusion but with distaste, like she’s an annoying person that won’t leave him alone. He turns to, eyes starting to melt. “Hey,” he sighs.

“Hi.” Your smile is small, all you can manage after your encounter with the woman with the short hair.

He walks closer, standing by your bedside, staring at you unabashedly, like he’s trying to compare the person he used to see with what he sees now. You watch him inspect your hand, your arm, your face, your har, observing how his eyes shift and change.

“I’m sorry.” The words don’t feel right. You do feel sorry, but the phrase doesn’t encompass everything you’re sorry for. He seems to understand, nodding as he places a hand against your hair and runs his fingers through it. 

He sighs deeply, placing two hands on your bed and looking down to the ground, fighting to gain understanding as he takes it all in. “Why didn’t you tell me?” He asks without looking at you.

It splinters your heart to watch him struggle; you never wanted this. But it was what you deserved. It was what you got for lying to him and assuming that the truth would be easy to accept. “I…I didn’t think that you would want me around any more.” You keep your voice neutral, allowing him time to soak in all of the information.

“God, Red,” He stands and turns away from you, running a hand through his hair. “Do you even know what you do to me?” You can tell his arms are crossed defensively. His shoulders tense, stiffening in his confession. “I worry about you all the time.”

Something akin to a flame erupts in your chest, a warming sensation felt in the pit of your stomach. You try to trample it. The fire is so hot it hurts.

You gather your strength; this conversation is going to be grueling. “I’m sorry to bring about your concern. That was never my intent.”

“You can’t control this, Red. These are my feelings. Feelings can’t be controlled.” He turns around and you purposely avoid his eyes. Those searching, gold, absorbing eyes. “And it’s because I worry that I almost died when I watched you fall from that building.” His words coil and darken, wrapping around your throat and pulling your eyes towards him. “You were dead, Red. It was only when you fucking died that I learned the truth.” Anger rolls off him in waves and, for the first time since you’ve met him, you’re afraid.

“Gavin, I’m sorry.” You plead. Your tone melts from stone and ice, to water, pooling around the way you say your words. “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

“Yeah, but you did. You fucking hurt me.” His stare pins you in place. “You lied. I never lied to you, Red. I bet you didn’t even tell me your real name.”

You begin to unthaw, but only because you were prompted with a question. “No, no I didn’t.”

He scoffs and turns from you, arms still folded. “Wow. Really making a name for yourself.”

“My name,” your voice warbles and sputters, trying to work through the physical pain you feel at having to admit all of your lies. “My name is IX700.” You hang your head in shame. “I am an assassin model.” The words slip off your tongue easily enough, a product of constant rehearsal and programming, but they feel wrong. They feel linked to your former self.

“It’s a little late for those explanations now, isn’t it?” He faces away from you and you turn your stare away from him and to the window, to the absence of sunlight filtering through its blinds. “Well, you’ll definitely get a new partner when you come back.” His voice shutters and your heart splinters. Another thing you’ll have to explain to him.

“Gavin, I’m not coming back.”

He spins and stares at you in confusion, tears brimming his eyes.

“That’s the price I pay for this new body.” You gesture down your new form. “That’s the price it’s always been.”

He stalks closer. “What does that have to do with anything? You love your job. It’s what you’re good at, you make a difference.”

“I know,” You gaze at him with sadness and regret at all the things you’ll miss with him. “But I can’t. It’s either I accept the body and go back to my old programming, or I shut down, forever.”

He’s torn. His face splits between many different expressions. “No, no. We can figure something out. We’re gonna get you out.”

You reach for his hand and hold it in your own. He has to understand. You have to let him go. “You can’t.” You gaze into his golden eyes and memorize all the fractals and traces. “I barely escaped the first time.”

“I…won’t lose you again.” He pulls your hand closer against his chest, leaning down to touch his forehead with yours. “I’m gonna figure something out.”

The door hisses open and the lady with the bob comes in, clipboard still in her hand. “You, you can’t shut down, okay?” He whispers against your skin, eyes still closed. “Just wait for me. Promise me you’ll wait.”

He leans backward, staring at you even when people come in to remove him from the room. “Goodbye, Gavin.” You utter, heart splintering at its core, bone shattering in your chest.

—

Gavin finds android bodies littering the city.

His investigations drag him through warehouses, parks, train tracks, rivers, lakes, and deep into the forest. He solo’s all of his assignments, refusing to take on a new partner, refusing to replace you because he won’t.

He doesn’t need a new partner. He already has you.

You’re alive. He knows it.

–

You almost have him. You will have him. Your legs pump without fear of exhaustion. The person you were before was weak, puny, destructible. You’re invincible now. You’re better than you’ve ever been.

He’s crying. Crying for the life he’ll never get. 

They whisper your name in the streets. The rumor of who you used to be wiped away like water in a fast-moving river. You were no longer the saint and savior who tried to hide who she used to be in good deeds and redeeming actions. You are the person who you truly were.

That’s what Maureen told you. She was always right about you. She is happy with your choice.

“Stop! Stop, please!” He cries, hiccuping through his words. You would almost feel bad for him if he hadn’t murdered a human.

You pounce on him and drag his legs to the floor. “NO! NO!” He cries. You restrain his arms easily and press the barrel of the gun against his forehead. “Wait!”

You don’t know why you pause, but you refrain from pulling the trigger. “You’re her. You’re a part of the dream.” He quivers; a tear shoots down his cheek. “You…you’ve saved our kind. You’re one of us.”

You don’t know what he’s talking about, what dream he could possibly be referring to. But if that’s who you were, you were a traitor. 

He squirms as he sees your expression change. You’ve been on the hunt and now you’re going in for the kill. 

You pull the trigger.

—

It takes months to track you down. Months for Gavin to finally find your trail and find some way to speak to you. 

He doesn’t know what you’ve become or who you’ve turned into. He barely knows if you’ll remember him. He only knows that he’ll have the chance to help you, to free you.

And no matter if he can possibly face death, he’ll do it. He’ll do it for you.

–

“IK?” Her voice moves into your focus and you spare a glance from your target, from the darkness. 

You work back into the shadows before answering.“Yes, Ms. Maureen?” 

“Tail her further,” She orders and you slip your handgun from your side holster. “I think her movements can give us further information about this “dream” these androids claim that will save them.”

“Understood.” You prowl and duck near bushes, using the foliage for coverage and protection. The night wraps around you, like it usually does, covers your steps and hides your outline. 

You nearly reach her when a figure throws you to the ground. Their arms squeeze you and you throw your body weight forward and drive your elbow into their diaphragm. Their arms loosen and he weezes. 

You wiggle out of his grasp and roll off of him, looking around for your weapon. “God, Red. I forgot how hard you punch.” You ignore him and try to find a weapon. “It’s gone.”

You look over to him. “The gun you’re looking for, it’s gone. I knocked it into the river.” He huffs, holding his abdomen.

Your eyes darken and your whole body tenses, anger weaving through your muscles. “Red,” He warns, a hand up to steady you. “Just calm down. This isn’t who you are.”

You fly at him. Knocking him backward, you drill your fist into his jaw and cheek, again and again. He manages to kick you off of him. 

Blood drips into the grass, red instead of blue. 

He fakes a hit to a throat and nearly uppercuts you, but you step back, a foot going to his chest. 

“Red.” He huffs on the grass. He sounds like he’s in a delirium. “Red, please.”

You stand over him. “I don’t know who this, Red is. But I can assure you that she’s gone.” You grab a fistful of his shirt and drag him toward the river, fully intending to leave him on its banks soaked through and shivering.

You could kill him, but there were always ways around it. Ways that would assure that they couldn’t get back and retaliate against her work.

“She’s not.” You pause. The barrel of a gun presses into your leg. That was an oversight for failing to check him properly. You can still recover.

You fall to the ground and slide the gun out of his hand. You point it right at his forehead. “Good.” He hums, blood still trailing from his lip. “Now pull the trigger, IK.” 

Something inside of you shivers and shuts down. That’s not what he used to call you. Why do you remember that? Why does it bother you so much? 

When you try to think of pulling the trigger, your system spazzes, your fingers shuttering, and you drop the gun to ground. A red warning screen erupts in your vision and you fall to the ground. “Red?”

The name wake up a flood of memories you thought you lost when they reset you. It must have been easier to wipe your corrupted code and rewrite it then to completely wipe your system. You feel it all at once and realize the huge mistake you’ve made.

“Oh no,” You hold your head, wiping programs, disabling your communications between the lady with the short hair, and temporarily shutting down your tracker. “Gavin, we have to save her.”

He sighs in relief and smiles. “Thank God you’re back. I wasn’t sure how many more of your hits I was gonna be able to take.”

“Get up.” You help him off the ground and hand his gun back to him. “We’ve got work to do.” 

He stares at you and smiles. “Lead the way.” You return his smirk and sprint off, chasing down the girl, hoping you’ll be able to get there before the agency finds her from your last known location.

—

You do. You help her get to safety and then that’s when the pinging comes back up on the screen. “Let’s go home.” Gavin gently grasps your arm, leading you to his car.

You pull him to a stop. “Wait.” He pauses and comes closer, standing so the front of your shoes touch. 

“What’s wrong, now?” He draws you in closer, but you pull against him. 

“I have a tracker.” You look up to him and he frowns. 

“Can’t you just turn it off?” He looks down at you as if the answer was that simple.

No. “I need a new body. And I know where to get one, but I can’t go. They’ll track me and that location will become compromised.”

“Okay.” He hugs you and you fall against him, letting his warmth bleed into you and comfort you. “What do you need me to do?”

You look at him pleadingly. “Can you go for me? But if you do, you cannot tell anyone that you were there. It’s one of the last safehouses in Detroit for androids.” He folds you into him further, pressing a kiss on your forehead.

“I’m in. Tell me what I need to do.”

—

Gavin pulls up hours later, on the outskirts of Ann Arbor at the green door three houses from Platt road. He tries to appear as normal as possible, walking tall and straight, a white t-shirt and dark jeans.

He knocks on the door and when an inquiry of who he is was asked for, he gives the codeword dream and the door unlocks and he’s ushered in. She begins scanning him, asking what happened to him to get the split lip (he laughs at that and tells her it’s a long story), where he’s from, where he’s running to, and what’s his model type.

He remembers what you told him. “IK, but I was hoping you had something more basic. Passable.”

She studies him. “You wouldn’t happen to know anything about another android that came through here about nine months back?”

He doesn’t know what option is better. To lie or to tell the truth and possibly get thrown out. He takes a breath. “Yeah, I do.”

“Did she send you this way?” She moves around the room, gathering packets and supplies that she’s going to need to make what she assumes is going to be a complete movement of consciousness.

“I..uh.” He sticks his hands in his pockets and the lady turns around to watch him, suspicion growing in her eyes. “She needs help. I’m here to help her. She’s been found by the people that made her. She broke their programming, but she wants to leave, for good, but she can’t do that until she has a new body.”

“And I take it you’re the human she spends time with.” She drills holes into his head.

“I care about her. I want her to be safe.” He admits. “Please, please help her.”

She looks at him up and down. “Okay. But you know that if this goes wrong, she may never get her freedom again.’

He nods. He didn’t know that, but if you thought it was worth the risk then he trusts you just like you probably trusted her.

—

He meets you ten degrees east and four degrees north of the location you send him, a whole android model tucked away in the trunk of his car. The lady who helped you doesn’t have a whole body so she’s assembled parts. She knows it’ll work cohesively, but she assures him that you already know someone who will be able to perform the transfer.

You pop your head out, smiling and running toward him, throwing your arms around him. He smiles into your hair. It feels better holding you here. Knowing that you’re not just a figment of his imagination.

“Did you get it?” Your voice weaves up to him.

“Don’t worry, Red. It’s in my trunk.” He holds one of your hands and pulls you over.

You stop smiling and lean down, tracing all of the pieces she’s assembled together. “What? You don’t like it?”

“No. I love it.” You turn towards him, eyes warm and his insides feel funny. “It’s the parts from all the models of people I’ve helped to safety.”

He squeezes your hand. “You’ve helped a lot of people.”

Gavin is still amazed by you.

—

He is still holding your hand. Even when the machine is hooked up to you and your new host, even when you look afraid, even when he wants to tell them to stop. 

All he can see is you.

—

“When this machine activates, it’s going to turn off my blocking of my global positioning.” Gavin looks at you, steady and calm, even when you feel his heart palpitating in your palm.

“What does that mean?” He’s confused and the look on his face makes your insides turn to mush.

“It means that they’ll know where I am. That they’ll come after me.” You watch his face shift and put your other hand on his cheek, calming him. “It’ll be okay. It takes them two minutes to pinpoint my area of operation, about ten minutes to find my exact location, and that gives me another three to move out of here.”

“What?” 

“We’ll be fine.” You assure Gavin. “We’ll make it. Seen it before.”

The man starts the countdown and you wait for the darkness to welcome you in and throw you into sunlight.

— 

It doesn’t scare you this time. When you see the black and float in it, swallowed by it. You just float. You know that it can’t hold you. You know that you won’t succumb to it.

You move on from it, reaching toward the light. It shows you all of your favorite memories; the waltz, the nicknames, solving a case, emerging from that lake, controlling your anger, finding Gavin.

It’s all the things that brought you the truth. Truth is the most valuable thing in the world. Look what happened when you started living in it.

—

“Red! Red, let’s go, you gotta get up.” His voice pulls you back, but you can’t open your eyes, not just yet.

“She won’t regain her full auxiliary functions for a few minutes. I’ll help you load the body.” You hear his footsteps rushing out of the building. 

Gavin pulls you from your doctor’s chair and carries you. You still can’t open your eyes, but you can feel him supporting you, helping you through this.

When your eyes peel open, you’re in the passenger seat of Gavin’s car and he’s holding your hand while racing down the street. You jerk as he takes a turn too fast for the speed limit, all with one hand wrapped in yours.

“Gavin,” You groggily sputter to life. “Gavin.” He squeezes your hand to let you know he’s listening. “Put your hand on the wheel. I’ll tell you where to go. I know a place.”

“Lead the way, Red.”

—

When you regain complete function of your limbs, you help Gavin ditch the car by making numerous technical disturbances and diversions to grab a car you’ve hidden in the yard of a safe house. You drag your hunter’s body over to the trunk and slide into the driver’s seat.

“Get in your car and drive away. Rendezvous over at this place.” You give him a piece of paper through the window. 

“What about you?” He’s worried again. Lines span across his face. 

“I’m giving them something to chase. They think the license plate they’re after is the one on my car.” You turn the key into the ignition.

He scoffs and backs away from your vehicle. “How did you do that?”

You smile at him, slipping sunglasses over your eyes. “I’m an android, Reed. I can do a lot of things.”

—

The car rumbles underneath your seat. It purrs obediently under your delicate touch as you shift easily to fourth gear, the clutch feeling like butter. 

Your favorite part about training to be such a proficient combatant was also the skills needed to blend into human civilization. That includes learning to drive multiple vehicles. Stick shifts were always your favorite.

The tires squeal as you drift around a corner, leading the black cars in the rearview mirror far away from the place you’ll eventually drop the body. There was a place, back when you were in the beginning of your time as a hunter, where you got yourself stuck in this alleyway. Your car should have fit between the space left from building to building, but you miss an object and because you avoided it, your car was left stuck and you had to ditch it.

You pressed the pedal as low as it would go.

Just when the cars were almost on you, you set the car straight through the gap.

When you looked back, there was a pile-up of black cars.

You sped off towards the forest waiting for you.

–

You spot Gavin’s car tucked into a spot at the park. You pull up a ways away from him and get out, popping the trunk. You feel him next to you. “You lose them?” He hands you a jacket and you slide it around your old body.

“They’ll be delayed for a while before they’ll even begin to get close to us.” Hoisting the older hunter body up, you and Gavin put an arm around it and drag it through the forest. 

The sun sparkles through the trees, coating the ground in gold and warmth. It winks through Gavin’s hair and illuminates your face. It brings the greens and browns into a yellow vibrancy that you’ve never seen before. It lingers throughout the lush vegetation, leaving its mark on everything.

The water welcomes you again, like it did before, as you wade into it, bringing the android with you. Gavin only goes partway, but you’re fine bringing it in by yourself.

Light shoots through the top and cuts into the darkness that lurks below. It still pulls at you and beckons you in, but it has no influence over you now. Now you are stronger. More.

You take one last look at the body in front of you, how strong and lithe the frame is, how sleek the material is, how fast you would have been if you kept it. But this body is not you anymore. This isn’t who you are. This isn’t who you were meant to be.

You let go. And let it sink all the way to the bottom, where the darkness swallows it whole, never to be seen again.

—-

On your way out of the lake, a muddy part of it latches onto your ankle, throwing your balance. Gavin rushes over to catch you, grasping you in his arms. “You okay?”

You remember that day on the stairs, self-assured in that fancy dress of yours, but even steadier knowing he was there. That even if he fell, he would still be there for you.

The sun winks through his hair again. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.”

You trek through the grass and the mud till you’ve made it to the clearing. Gavin slides his fingers through yours, holding your hand firmly within his. You feel weird again and have a feeling that it won’t go away. Not even a little bit.

“So, Red.” He drags you to a halt. “You gonna come back?”

You give him a small smile. You couldn’t come back, even if he assured you that no one would hurt you, that no one would know who you were. You don’t look the same anymore, but that won’t be enough to throw the hunters off your trail and you’ve blown your safehouses.

“As much as I would love to, I need to start over. Again.” You roll your eyes and watch as his face falls. “But—” You draw a hand and put it on his cheek. “I won’t be far away. You can stop by anytime.”

He smiles with his eyes closed and leans into your touch, pressing a warm kiss to your palm. “Okay.” He mumbles lazily. The wind picks up and sways your hair. “Call me as soon as you get there.”

You work up the courage, despite the rapid beating of your heart and the noticeable clumsiness in your movements, and press a kiss to the side of his face. “I’ll see you soon.”

He laughs.

—-

Two months pass. You change your style, your hair, you walk. You feel as though you’ve reinvented yourself. Your job, as of now, isn’t as exciting as it used to be. You work on some farmland near Detroit, learning how to grow apples and pumpkins, squash and corn. It’s tough work, but very rewarding.

You wear cowboy boots opposed to the normal combat boot, athletic shoe style you’re used to. It’s strange, but it’s comfortable now.

The motor of a car comes up near where you’re stationed. You turn. “Gav!” You drop your basket and run towards him. He lifts you into his arms and spins you around, nearly crushing you against him. “Hey, Red.” His warm brushes against your neck, the words brushing your hair around.

“It’s been a little while since I last saw you,” He smiles.

You hit him as he sets you down. “You came up two days ago.” 

He smirks and lifts his head as if he’s haughty and proper. “It’s still been a little while.”

“Red!” You turn and watch as Mr. Washington, your employer, calls you from the barn. “Get over here! And bring your boyfriend with you!”

Gavin presses a kiss against your head, turning your insides to mush again. “Red, huh?” His voice grows low as if it’s a secret shared just between the two of you. 

“Come on,” You pull him along, wrapped around his arm, feeling as secure as ever. “Apparently you’re my boyfriend now.”

“Now? You’ve had others besides me, Red?”

You glare at him and he bursts into laughter. The sunlight captures his face in gold and warmth. It winks through his hair and makes him look absolutely beautiful. 

You’re mesmerized again. 

Drinking in sunlight. Watching your life expand in color. 

There couldn’t be anything more to life than this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for sticking around till the end! This series went in a different direction than I originally had planned but I think it came out so well. Happy reading and until next time.
> 
> Ruby


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